Avery's Colorful Carrot Grex Collaboration Thread

[avery.bowron]

I started this grex of colorful carrot varieties in 2024, and collected seed from the first generation of roots last summer. Full details of the varieties included and additional photographs can be found in the 2025 carrot grow reports thread, but I’m creating this separate thread as a place to provide updates over time and hopefully coordinate local collaboration since I have more seed than I can use on my own even after contributing to the GTS seed share.

To that end, I’m bringing a bunch of packets of seed from this grex to local seed swap events along with informational brochures from GTS. My hope is to inspire others to participate in this project and potentially connect with this community. Each packet will have a small paper print out with basic information about the grex and a QR code that leads to this post. I will share a few updates from my own grow out here throughout the season and also email them to anyone who has signed up for updates. In a best case scenario, we could organize a meet up to do a taste testing event and select the best roots for next year’s seed grow out, but that will require people being interested!

If you grow near the Seattle area in western Washington State and would like to participate in this project, you can reply to this thread, send me a direct message, or send me an email at: seattle.grexes@gmail.com if you prefer not to join the going to seed discourse community. I may still be able to provide some seed.

[Patate]

Beautiful colors!

I’m one year behind you up here in Quebec (a groundhog ate all my carrots in 2024). I might also be growing some of your seeds this year! I look forward to seeing more people producing and contributing carrot seeds over the next few years.

[malterod]

Beautiful colors @avery.bowron , I like how much red you’ve been able to keep in the grex. I’ve learned red is the most recessive color. Difficult to develop, but easy to keep when you have it (red x red always gives red I assume).

How do you feel about the green necks? The trait is hard to get rid of. My understanding is it doesn’t affect flavor, but all modern varieties have aggressively selected against it.

Do you breed for Resistance against carrot fly ?

I’d love to get your input on my Large carrots for cooking as I also document my progress.

[avery.bowron]

More accurate to say that I’ve started with plenty of red and purple than that I’ve maintained it. These roots are all from the first and second year grow out so are true to variety and served as the seed producing roots for my first two years of crossing. I do hope to maintain plenty of color in the mix going forward through selection. If you can get your hands on any of the Wisconsin Purple Carrot Breeding Population from EFN, I was pleased with its contributions in this years grow out (upper right quadrant of the upper photo and all four roots in lower photo).

I included the Uzbek golden variety before reading more deeply about carrot genetics and the green shoulders, but I quite like them in all other respects and the green doesn’t bother me much. I can see it being an issue aesthetically in the culinary and commercial contexts but that’s more a matter of personal taste than a severe flaw in my view. This was the most robust of all the original varieties in my grow out (most consistent germination, most consistently large roots). It’s just okay as a raw eating carrot, but excellent cooked, especially in rice/pilaf dishes.

I have carrot rust fly in my area but the pressure is not intense. I have not actively selected for resistance so far as my primary goal at the beginning was to get seed from a wide range of crosses. I will likely passively select for resistance by focusing on saving robust roots with minimal damage in future years, but I won’t rule out saving roots with some damage if they grow to sufficient size and have highly desirable characteristics otherwise.

[haystack (Clint Freund)]

I grew the purple carrot grex that efn sells! Actually making seed again this year. Let me know if you need any stock seed!

How’s your project going?

Clint

[malterod]

Row 7 just released a yellow carrot with green shoulders called Kuroda Dawn and say it is delicious. Perhaps give it a try and let us know. It seems Green shoulders do not affect taste, just like color in carrot in general dont. Our eyes affect our taste though, that is unavoidable. But the eyes can be educated.

[UnicornEmily (Emily Martha Sorensen)]

What does the purple carrot with the orange core taste like? It looks soooooo pretty cut open like that.

[avery.bowron]

Those four carrots were all from the EFN - UW Wisconsin breeding population mentioned above. The two in the center with solid orange cores had the best raw flavor of that batch, much like a sweet Nantes type. The other two had flavor notes that were a bit strong for my taste raw (less sweet, more piney/carrot-y), but I suspect would have been excellent cooked.

[avery.bowron]

Thanks for the offer, Clint. I still have more seeds than space to grow them in, but I’ll keep this in mind and reach out if something goes sideways with this year’s seed crop.

I distributed about 40 packets of seed between two different seed swap events and got 6 contacts who signed up for email updates and a potential taste test. Unfortunately work life has been quite busy and I haven’t managed to follow up with folks yet but anticipate doing so once I start sowing seeds in the next few weeks.

[avery.bowron]

I finally got around to sending an email update to everyone who provided contact information at the seed swap events, and am posting it here in case other people find their way here by scanning the QR code on their seed packets.

Hello!

You’re receiving this message because you provided contact information when you took home some of my colorful carrots at a seed swap event this spring. Thank you for your interest in this collaborative carrot breeding project.

How are things going in your garden? Have you planted your carrots? Here in West Seattle, it’s a time of transition as my winter and spring crops give way to warm season species like corn, beans, squash, basil, and cucumbers. Yesterday I took advantage of that turnover to seed another round of carrots, filling in the gaps in an earlier sowing and tucking seeds into those in-between spaces where warm season crops will eventually fill in, but not for a while.

An earlier sowing with uneven germination

Spring sown carrots starting to take off

Carrots like full sun, but will tolerate partial shade, especially after they’ve germinated and begun to grow. Because this is the first year I’m evaluating my own saved seed, I’m planting a lot of carrots, and pushing the boundaries of where I would usually grow them in my garden. Ironically, the places where I’ve had the best germination are in the hard-packed lawn in a shady corner of my yard where I cleaned the seed last fall, and in my asparagus bed, where I discarded my “poor quality” seeds after winnowing.

Dense patch of winter-sown carrots growing beneath a jungle of fava beans and asparagus.

After removing a few small roots that were bolting (sending up a flowering stalk) prematurely, I harvested one of the larger carrots from this tangled mess. It was an unusual light pinkish flesh-toned color on the outside, but vibrantly multicolored inside with a crisp texture and sweet flavor. I can’t wait to see what else shows up this summer & fall!

Happy growing,

Avery

P.S. If you would prefer not to receive any more updates, let me know and I’ll remove you from this list. If you have questions about this project or how you can participate in selecting carrots to grow for seed next year, feel free to ask.

If you would like additional resources on growing carrots, I found this guide from Fruition Seeds a helpful place to start:

Growing-Guide-Carrots.pdf

[avery.bowron]

This year’s spring-sown carrots are sizing up nicely and showing color variation in the shoulders & foliage. These are tempting me to harvest now out of curiosity, but I’d like to give them a full season of growth before evaluating them for seed saving. For now, I’m sticking to only harvesting plants that are clearly smaller than their neighbors in areas that need thinning or have some defect like this one that split.

This short + stout growth form seems prevalent in many of the roots I’ve culled so far, likely due to genetics from Gniff and/or Uzbek golden.

I’ve also recently sown one last bed with seed from last year’s secondary umbels. I’ll use that to select plants that are quick enough to size up before the fall harvest.

[gregg_muller]

I have successfully sown seed in late summer, got small roots to develop, store in ground or dig and fridge, then let them flower the next spring. Cuts out the first spring/summer, but you cant assess full growth potential. Trade offs…

[avery.bowron]

Totally. That’s why I’ve sown several batches of seed through the season. This last sowing, my intent is really only to see how many roots will mature to a reasonable size. If any stand out in such a short time, I’ll add them to next year’s seed grow out. If not, I’ll have a bunch of baby carrots to eat this winter.

[avery.bowron]

Quick update on this last sowing. After 2 weeks, I’ve seen much better and consistent germination compared with all my other sowings this year. The bed was thoroughly sifted to remove grass roots immediately before seeding and the surface was mostly soil vs the other beds I planted in this spring and summer having a thin layer of mulch at the surface. Not sure if that made a difference, or if it was just easier to keep this spot evenly moist because it gets late afternoon shade.