Vegetable Plant Part Relationships. I. Effects of Time and Population Density on the Shoot and Storage Root Weights of Carrot (Daucus carota L.)

Chantenay carrot plants were grown in replicated plots containing densities of 25, 64, 130 and 245 plants m−2 and harvested on 20 weekly occasions giving a total of 360 pairs of d. wts and 13908 pairs of f. wts of shoots (s) and roots (r). The relationship between the logarithms of s and r was curved for plants sampled on successive occasions from the same density but it was linear for plants sampled on a single occasion, both within and between densities. A good overall relationship was In s = a+0.805 In r, where the intercept (a) ranged in approximately equal steps from +1.2 to −1.1 at the first and last harvests respectively. Except for some systematic deviation from this equation at early harvests, the above relationship fitted the data well irrespective of the wide range of density and whole plant weight.