Measure Garden-Soil Compaction With a Carrot Test

Reader Contribution by Anna Hess And Mark Hamilton
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Carrot shapes are influenced by soil texture.

As you pull carrots out of your garden this fall, you can use the roots to get an idea about your soil’s quality. You might have already noticed the differences in shape between carrots grown in different parts of your garden in year past. For example, did you ever dig up a bed of carrots and find that all of the roots had split and twisted into a jumbled mess? Sometimes, carrots curl around each other because you didn’t thin the crop sufficiently. But splitting, gnarled carrots that aren’t closely intertwined are generally a sign that your soil is either compacted or is full of pebbles and rocks.

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