Parsnips have a reputation for being rather tricky beasts. It’s a shame, because once you’ve got them growing, there’s really nothing you have to do except wait nine months or so for their delicious roots to swell into something worth harvesting. Save a little bit of watering in hot weather, that really is it.

But starting the seeds in the first place is what puts so many first-time veg growers off this marvellous crop. The problem is that parsnips need to be sown pretty early in the season so they have long enough to grow big and fat and scrummy. And sowing so early can mean the blighters don’t germinate at all.

Last season, I grew an enormous crop of parsnips. This wasn’t because I’m particularly great at growing veg, but just because I did a few vaguely sensible things at sowing time.

The first was to buy fresh seeds. I never get the whole way through a packet of parsnip seeds, but there really is no point trying to germinate last year’s seeds as their viability drops off so quickly.

Then I sowed the parsnips in toilet roll tubes, indoors. This meant I could steal a march on the rather chilly weather at the end of February. I sowed them on a sunny windowsill, watered, and waited. It was the waiting that got me when I first started growing parsnips. I could never believe how long it took the seeds to get going. Like grumpy teenagers, they prefer to have a nice long lie-in of, oh, at least 20 days before they pop out.

But once the seedling had popped up, I knew I needed to be quick. Because within a few days, a small white threadlike root was peeping out of the bottom of the toilet roll tube. And that meant it was time to plant out so the roots didn’t fork. I planted the parsnips out in their tubes, and covered them with a jam jar to keep them warm and away from slugs in their baby stages. But as soon as the plants were big enough to fend for themselves, I left them to it. I did absolutely nothing to them until November when I dug them up and started scoffing them. And that’s how to give parsnips the best start. Easy peasy.

For pocket-sized information about how to grow parsnips and other popular veg patch crops, visit our Grow page.