Carrot (Daucus), a genus of Umbelliferae, containing about 20 species, mostly natives of the Mediterranean countries. The common carrot (D. Carota) is a biennial plant, which ranges as far as India in the wild state, and is universally cultivated for the sake of its root. In all varieties of the wild plant this is slender, woody, and of a very strong flavour; that of the cultivated variety is much thicker and more fleshy, much milder in its flavour and qualities. Its colour is generally red, but sometimes orange or yellowish white. The sub-varieties in cultivation are also distinguished by their form—some being longer and more tapering than others—by their size, and by the duration of their growth; the early kinds, 'Horn carrots,' being also comparatively small, and almost exclusively cultivated in gardens for culinary use, whilst the larger and late kinds, 'Long carrots,' are often also grown in fields, especially on the Continent, for feeding cattle. The carrot was known to the ancients, but is said to have been introduced into England from Holland only in the 16th century. In the reign of Charles I., Parkinson relates that ladies sometimes wore carrot-leaves as an ornament instead of feathers; and the beauty of the leaves is still occasionally acknowledged by placing a root, or the upper portion of one, in water, that it may throw out young leaves to adorn apartments in winter. The carrot prefers a light and rather sandy soil, but often succeeds very well on a peat soil.
Besides the various uses in cookery and in feeding cattle, carrots have been roasted and ground in Germany as a substitute for coffee; a syrup is also sometimes prepared from the roots, and even an ardent spirit distilled after fermentation. Carrots were formerly also of some medicinal repute as a laxative, vermifuge, poultice, &c.; and the 'seeds' (mericarps) have been employed as a substitute for caraways.
The carrot has many insect enemies which often inflict the greatest injuries upon the crop. Besides suffering from the attacks of a large number of lepidopterous larvæ (Depressaria, &c.), the leaves have one or two species of aphids peculiar to them. Serious subterranean mischief is often wrought by the larva of the cockchafer (Melolontha), and still more by the larva of Agriotes segetis, one of the wire-worms so dreaded by farmers. The larva of the carrot fly (Psila rosæ) eats away the surface of the root, causing the so-called rust of carrots.
The Candy Carrot or Cretan Carrot is Athamanta cretensis, while the Deadly Carrot is Thapsia silphium, another umbellifer of great medical repute in classic times. The name Native Carrot is given in Tasmania to the elongated tubers of Geranium parviflorum.