Questionable Carrots:

I've been trying to grow carrots recently.  And not having too much luck.  Here are some carrots I harvested a week or two ago:

I think they are Scarlet Nantes carrots, but quite truthfully, they were from a Feed the Children free gift of seeds.  There were no dates, names, or other information on the package.  So I just randomly tried them because they were free.  Anyway, these guys above that I pulled were really bitter, and as you can see they are short and stubby.  I have to admit, the soil I had in this planter box wasn't so great.  It was just old, clumpy, store bought potting mix.  And the planter bed is sitting on dirt, but it's really hard dirt.  So I'm wondering if the soil wasn't loose enough to grow these very well.  I still have about 3 carrots to pull out, but I'm thinking the rest won't be so good either.

These are the first carrots I've ever grown, and so once the green leafy tops came up I didn't know when I was supposed to harvest them.  But reading up on websites I learned that you're supposed to brush the dirt off the shoulders of the carrots and wait till they are big enough around. Unfortunately, all these carrots are really big up top, but they are short!  So that's the one thing you won't know -- how long they are going to be.

I've planted some Atomic Red carrots (http://www.victoryseeds.com/carrot_atomic-red.html) in my 2'x4' square foot garden.  In some really nice loose soil.  So I'm thinking those might turn out well.   I saw them sprouting little guys when I went out this evening to check on things.