Sow What?

Gigante Sardo

Well the answer to that is any time you want to sow them.  There is such a huge variety of radish seeds available to grow that it means you can sow the seeds all year round and be harvesting a fresh radish 12-months of the year.

Did you know that there are two main types of radish?  There is the summer variety and the winter variety.  The summer radish will generally have red, pink or white skins are normally quite small and round although there are pointed and even cylindrical ones.  The round ones will not grow much larger than 3-4cm diameter and the long ones will reach an average of around 6-7cm so generally they are much smaller than the winter varieties which are much larger and not unlike, although slightly smaller than, turnips or parsnips.

Growing a radish is not something that should fill you with fear. Okay, maybe a little terror, but not fear.  Growing a radish is really not difficult, they can take to any soil especially the winter varieties which are happy growing in almost anything and they are not too bothered about cold winds or too much sunlight.  However to maximise your crop, especially summer radishes, an open site with plenty of sunshine is preferred with a medium to light soil.  If you want to go crazy then a little manure on the area, before planting, will help with some extra nutrients and help keep moisture in the soil.  The winter radish is happy to sit in heavier soils but the summer radish is happier away from the heavy soil and growing in a nice fertile, moisture retentive area.

Normally you would sow your radish seeds directly into your plot.  Make a small line in your soil about 0.5 – 1cm deep and sow a continuous line of seed allowing 4-5g of seed per 10-meters.  Allow between 10 – 30cm between each row depending upon the variety you are sowing.  Cover the seed, water and allow nature to do the rest.  Radishes can be sown under cover to plant out at a later stage.  Sow the seed to the same depth but you may wish to sow a smaller number of seeds in either a tray or in pots.  Plant out the seedlings leaving 3-5 cm between each (for the summer varieties) and 15-20cm for the winter varieties.

Winter Nero Radish

Once sown, apart from a gentle water, you shouldn’t need to do too much until thinning (or planting out if sown under cover).  This should be done when the seedlings have reached around 5cm in height or when they have grown a couple of leaves.  Simply pull out and discard the weaker plants to leave a space (as detailed above) for the stronger plants to mature.  You may transplant some stronger seedlings to fill in holes just remember to be gentle.

Radishes will grow quickly and you will get a lot for your money if you look after them so keep the area watered.  As we have said, the summer radish is generally quite small so you don’t have to go mad with the water, just keep the soil damp so maybe a soaking once a week during dry spells and don’t forget to pick out the weeds.

The summer radish will only take 6-8 weeks to mature and you should be getting around 350-400 radishes for every 10-meters planted.  Not a bad return on your investment of a packet of seeds.  The winter radish will take a couple of addition weeks to mature and gives a return of around 50 radishes per 10-meters, but they are much bigger.  As there is such a long sowing period don’t fall into the trap of sowing all of your seeds at once and then having far too many radishes all at once.  Stagger your sowing.  If you plan ahead a little and leave a couple of weeks between each sowing, you will have a continuous supply of fresh radishes right through the year as this method can be applied to both summer and winter varieties.

You should be harvesting, and eating, the summer varieties as soon as they are ready and before they have the chance to get tough and lose their taste.  The winter radish can hang around in the soil a little longer although some varieties can be damaged by very heavy frost so make sure, before planting, when each variety is due to be harvested.  In our experience there are so many types of radish that are to be harvested right through the winter months you should not have any problems making your winter selection.

So having read all of this you need to get out and plant.  Remember you can plant a radish all year round and you can eat a fresh radish all year round.

ENJOY!