Pencil-thin carrots blamed on weather with prices set to rise

♦ Farmers are lamenting a crop of carrots “as thin as pencils” after the hot, dry weather stopped them growing.

Other crops, such as potatoes and onions, could also be affected because the planting season was delayed by a wet spring, which turned into a dry summer.

The lack of water may also cause a pea shortage. The UK is normally 97 per cent self-sufficient in carrot production. Guy Poskitt, 51, a carrot farmer, said: “There will be a smaller crop of carrots – even if it starts to rain now. Nobody wants carrots as thin as a pencil, so we won’t be able to sell some of them to the shops.” Experts say price rises are inevitable.

In order to keep cool and sleep in this sweltering weather, one wheeze recommended by readers has been to tuck yourself up with a bag of frozen peas. It acts like a reverse hot-water bottle. They might now think twice, because of the rising cost of peas provoked by this droughty spell. Market gardeners are forlornly contemplating fields of carrots, too, that resemble unhappy fashion models in their meagre girth. As for lettuces, in the great heat they have simply downed leaves and refused to grow unless guaranteed a regular man-made drenching. That’s nature for you. If we’re to relish home-grown produce in due season, we must take the limp with the plump. English cherries are one consolation prize. Some pattered down from their branches in June before they were ripe, but now the high-summer crop is here, and it is delicious.