Every vegetable that we grow has its potential issues. When it comes to root vegetables, carrot splitting, cracking, or deformation is a common issue.
You care for your carrot harvest for weeks and months, and the time has come to harvest those sweet treats. But once you pull them, you notice the roots are split, cracked in pieces, and maybe even rotting.
If you’re a first-time carrot grower, you may be wondering how this happened and how you can avoid it in the future. Read on to learn what it is, what causes it, and how to prevent it.
What is Carrot Splitting or Cracking?
You’ve undoubtedly come across carrots that looked like they’d befallen some type of injury or weird alien intervention during their growth period.
Carrot splitting often results in a carrot that looks like it has legs (or other extra appendages), while carrot cracking is more like a cut along the side.
Although these issues can happen with beets or radishes as well, they’re more common in carrots. This is because carrots tend to grow significantly larger than round root veggies, and thus are a bit more vulnerable during their growth period.
The 11 causes listed below are the most common contributors to imperfect carrot growth.
All of these issues can be avoided through careful planning and maintenance. Keep your soil well-aerated and nourished, use high-quality seeds, keep the soil consistently moist, and your carrots should grow long, straight, and luscious.
1. Soil Compaction
This is one of the primary causes of carrot splitting and one of the easiest to avoid.
Carrots need loose, well-draining soil that’s consistently moist to thrive. Soil that’s too compacted will cause the carrots to grow unevenly instead of straight and strong. When they grow this way, their skins can crack or split, leading to some funky-looking roots.
If you’re trying to grow these glorious root vegetables in soil that has too much clay in it or was previously hammered solid by livestock or vehicles, you aren’t going to have much luck.
You’ll need to till the soil down to about a foot or more to break up anything that’s gotten too compacted. Then, you’ll have to work in any amendments as needed, which leads us to our next tip.
You can also grow in a deep container or raised bed rather than trying to amend your existing soil.
2. Inappropriate Soil Composition
If you’re creating a carrot bed, ensure it’s full of loamy, sandy soil with plenty of well-aged compost. Potting soil with some added vermiculite is ideal, offering both aeration and moisture retention.
If you’re in an arid location, you may need to add additional water-retentive amendments such as coconut coir, sphagnum moss, or even shredded sheep’s wool.
In addition to incorrect composition, the wrong soil pH can cause carrot splitting. They thrive in neutral soil with a pH of 6.0-7.0. If it’s too high or too low, it’ll affect your carrots’ growth. Be sure to test your soil and adjust the acidity or alkalinity if needed.
3. Too Much Nitrogen
You’ll need to test the N-P-K levels in your soil to ensure that it isn’t too high in nitrogen (N). If there’s too much of it in the soil, your carrots will be more prone to cracking. An excess of this nutrient causes carrot roots to grow thick and fleshy, and too quickly.
This can crack their skin and leave them vulnerable to disease. As an aside, roots exposed to too much nitrogen are also significantly less flavorful. Aim for higher phosphorous (P) and potassium (K) for all your root veggies instead.
4. Rocks or Other Soil Obstructions
Carrot splitting is often caused by obstructions in the soil. As such, when you’re creating a bed for your carrots, you need to ensure that you remove all rocks, pebbles, sticks, and other debris.
This is easy to do if you’re filling newly created raised beds but is more difficult if you’re planting them into the ground.
If there are rocks or other obstructions in the soil, the growing carrot isn’t strong enough to push it out of the way. Instead, it’ll split and grow around it, leading to carrots that look like they have two or more “legs.”
As such, you need to dig down at least a foot and carefully rake and sift out anything that may cause carrot splitting during the growing season.
5. Inconsistent Watering
Another common cause of carrot cracking is inconsistent watering patterns.
They do best in soil that’s consistently moist, and their skins can crack if they’re either over- or under-watered. As a result, the best way to avoid this issue is to create a consistent watering schedule to keep their surroundings uniformly damp.
Your best bet is to lay down soaker hoses around the area that you turn on at a specific time every day. In fact, putting them on a timer is your best option.
Just note that if you’re in a drier location or dealing with a sudden heat wave, you’ll need to water them more often, and the reverse goes for a sudden rainy spell.
6. Overcrowding
If you don’t thin out your carrot seedlings so they have space to spread out and grow, you risk them splitting or cracking from overcrowding.
Since seed viability can be so random, it’s fine to sow generously: after all, you may only get one germination for every three to four seeds sown. Once they all sprout, however, you’ll need to thin out the crowded areas and relocate some seedlings to sparser locations.
An easy way to avoid this is to start your seeds in blocks ahead of time. Then, once they’ve sprouted, you can space them out to your heart’s content.
7. Extreme Temperature Fluctuations
This isn’t something you’ll have much control over, but extreme temperature fluctuations can also contribute to carrot splitting or cracking.
If your area experiences a sudden cold snap, the (consistently moist!) soil your carrots are growing in can freeze briefly, which can cause carrot skins to rupture. Similarly, if there’s an unexpected heat wave, that soil can suddenly dry up and damage the growing carrots’ skin cells.
Your best bet is to grow carrot varieties that have been cultivated in your area, as they’ll be ideally suited to your region’s growing conditions. Keep agricultural fleece and straw bales handy if you need a quick “blanket” to keep them warm, and water generously during heat waves.
8. Damage from Tools or Animal Activity
Sometimes, carrot splitting or cracking is simply caused by our own carelessness. For example, if you companion planted leeks alongside your carrots and dug them up roughly, you may have nicked some of your carrots’ roots with your trowel or Hori Hori knife.
These little cuts will expand in size as the carrots grow, resulting in long, deep cracks or furrows along their edges. Alternatively, depending on where you’ve cut the root and where it is in its growth cycle, it may split into “legs” instead.
Note that root damage isn’t always caused by our negligence: sometimes, animals damage these roots when digging around for snacks. Skunks and raccoons can scratch young carrots’ skins, and moles may gnaw on them a little before moving on to the next tasty treat.
9. Badly Timed Planting
Carrots don’t thrive in the heat of summer and are best as spring or autumn crops. Most people either start their carrot seeds indoors and transplant the seedlings out as soon as the last frost date passes, or they sow the seeds directly as soon as they can.
If they wait too long, the carrots won’t mature before the summer heat hits with full strength.
If you’re having problems with carrot splitting, take note of when you planted your seeds. Ensure that you either plant them as early as possible or wait until summer’s heat has abated and sow them as a fall crop instead.
10. Poor Seed Quality
Seeds lose their viability over time, and can cause carrot splitting, cracking, stunting, failure to thrive, vulnerability to disease, and many other developmental issues. As such, try to use the freshest, highest-quality seeds you can afford.
Purchase your seeds from a reputable retailer—local or online—and if you don’t use them all this season, store them properly for next year. The higher your seeds’ quality, the higher the germination rate will be, and the less likely your carrots will split or crack as they develop.
11. An Influx of Water
A sudden influx of water can cause the cells in the roots to swell, rapid growth, and excessive pressure in the root, resulting in cracking. This is even more common after the carrots have experienced a period of drought.
Sadly, there’s nothing you can do to fix it once this problem happens. So, as we mentioned, keep the moisture consistent. Then, if you have a massive rain on the horizon, consider covering your plants to limit the amount of moisture that reaches them.