At Gartneriet Marienlyst we harvest organic carrots nearly every day throughout the winter. The carrots are sown in May, and when they are fully grown in October/November, all beds are covered with a thin layer of plastic wrap, which get covered by up till half a meter layer of straw, to protect the carrots from the frost. This is huge work, and costs a lot of money. When it is time to harvest the carrots, we first have to remove all the straw again, roll up the plastic wrap and send it to recycling, and then sweep away the rest of the carrot tops. Finally we can harvest, and take the carrots to washing- and packing department.

All this is done pretty pain free as long as the weather is perfect, but when it is minus 15 degrees Celsius and there is a blizzard, it gets tough. Everything needs to happen quickly, and lot of unsuspected things can arise. The biggest issues come when it is a very wet and rainy winter. The whole field will turn in to mud, and it's not enough with one tractor, to pull the wagon out from the field. Then the carrots are often so muddy, so we cannot se right from wrong until they are washed. Therefore we have to wash them, to be able to throw away the bad once.

The advantage we get from doing it this way is that they keep their roots and top the whole winter, right until they get harvested. That makes them more juicy, and since they are washed just shortly after being harvested, they get very clean and shiny, because the dirt does not get enough time to dry out.