Carum carvi
Caraway
Common names: Wild Caraway, True Caraway
At a glance
- Light
- Full sun
- Spacing
- 20 cm, rows 30 cm
- Lifespan
- Biennial
- Sowing
- Apr, May, Aug, Sep
- Harvest
- Jul–Aug
- Hardiness
- Hardy down to −15 °C
- Water need
- Medium
- Origin
- Native to Germany
Photo: Franz Eugen Köhler, Köhler's Medizinal-Pflanzen · Public Domain · Source
This description was machine-translated.
Description
Caraway provides the spicy seeds used in bread, cabbage dishes, and cheese, and its aroma makes heavy foods more palatable. The biennial plant forms a rosette of leaves in its first year and blooms only in the second summer, before the seeds mature.
Care instructions
Sow caraway in spring or late summer in a sunny, relatively dry spot. Keep the bed weed-free in the first year and wait until the second summer. Harvest the seed heads in July or August, once they turn brown, and dry them upside down.
The care notes were machine-translated from German.
Garden year
SowingApr–May, Aug–Sep
HarvestJul–Aug
Germination
- Soil temperature
- from 8 °C, ideally 15 °C
- Days to sprout
- 14 to 28 days
- Light
- Sprouts in light or dark
- Sowing depth
- 1 cm
- How to start
- Sow straight into the bed
Soil & site
Soil pH
Soil type
loamy, humus-rich, moist, nutrient-rich
Caraway needs deep, loamy-humus soil that stays evenly moist. As a taprooted plant, it tolerates neither waterlogging nor decidedly dry, poor sandy soils. It tolerates lime well to gladly; on acidic soil, a dose of lime at sowing helps.
Feeding
Medium feeder
Months
Mar, Apr, Oct
A few weeks before the spring sowing, work mature compost or well-rotted manure shallowly into the soil. In the second year in place, give some more compost or horn shavings as the leaves start to grow (March/April). Feed sparingly, because too much nitrogen comes at the expense of the aroma.
Overwintering
Caraway is a biennial and gets through winters in Germany, Austria and Switzerland as a flat leaf rosette without trouble outdoors and without protection. The cold period is actually necessary so that it flowers and forms seed in the second year. In a container, place it frost-protected, as pots freeze through more than open ground.
Propagation
Methods
- From seed
Caraway is a biennial and is propagated exclusively by direct sowing outdoors. It hardly tolerates transplanting, as it forms a deep, unbranched taproot. Sow the seeds directly in their final place from April to May, or alternatively from August to September for an earlier harvest the following year. Caraway needs light to germinate: scatter the seeds in rows (about 30 cm between rows) or broadcast, only press them in flat and cover them at most thinly (around 0.5 cm). Keep the soil evenly moist; at about 15 to 20 °C the seeds germinate in 1 to 3 weeks. Later thin the seedlings to a spacing of around 20 cm. In the first year the plant forms only a leaf rosette and roots; the cold stimulus of winter then triggers flowering and seed formation in the second year. Choose a sunny, wind-sheltered spot with deep, free-draining soil that is not too heavy. Seeds from the shops (unsprouted, not roasted) are also suitable for sowing.
Companion planting
Good neighbors
amaryllis family (Amaryllidaceae)
Umbellifers and alliums confuse each other's pests (carrot fly, onion fly).
For example GarlicOnionLeekChivesWild daffodilRocambole and 12 more species in the catalogue
Source: classic companion planting (DACH-Gartenpraxis)
daisy family (Asteraceae)
Calendula and Tagetes next to carrots keep the carrot fly away with their scent.
For example French marigoldCalendulaSunflowerButterhead lettuceCommon coneflowerIceberg lettuce and 72 more species in the catalogue
Source: classic companion planting (DACH-Gartenpraxis)
cabbage family (Brassicaceae)
You can pair celery and dill with all Brassicaceae because they repel the cabbage whitefly with their scent, a proven companion.
For example White cabbageKohlrabiRadishKalebroccolicauliflower and 41 more species in the catalogue
Source: Bio-Gärtnerei Mixed-culture Practice
legume family (Fabaceae)
Peas and beans provide carrot and celery with nitrogen and grow as shallow-rooted plants without competition next to each other.
For example Bush beanPole beanBroad beanSnow peaWrinkled peaRunner bean and 35 more species in the catalogue
Source: classic companion planting (DACH-Gartenpraxis)
Rather not
Companion planting is partly traditional gardening lore. Where the reason is known, it is given.
Some of these explanations were machine-translated.
For your garden
Grow Caraway yourself
Gartenkern tells you when frost is coming, when to sow and when to harvest, for your location.
Free, no time limit
Notes from real gardens
What other gardeners have written down about this variety, anonymous and voluntary.
No notes shared yet. Will you be the first to write one down?