Growing daikon radishes

So, here I am growing daikon radishes for the first time, and a couple of questions have come up.

I planted a row about 8 feet long and a little too close together because I didn't know how well they would sprout. After they were up for a three weeks I thought I would pull one to see what it looked like. It was as skinny as can be and it's taste was VERY strong. It was like all the flavor of a two inch diameter radish was packed into that little thread of a radish root.

Six weeks have gone by now, and many of the radishes are blooming... another surprise to me.

So here are my questions for you daikon radish experts:

1. When can the radishes be thinned as something to EAT (with the normal mild flavor of a daikon)?

2. Is it normal for them to be blooming so soon after planting?

3. When is normal harvest time? I see they are called winter radishes by some. Is fall and later the right time to pick or will they be delicious in the summer too?

Hi Jon -

Your radishes are bolting. The long days are telling them to flower and not bother storing carbs in their roots.

This batch of daikon may best be left for seed. It's best sown in autumn and left to winter over in the ground. They're frost hardy down to -5C in my direct experience and probably more if mulched deeply...we don't get that cold here but in Tucson they had no trouble and cold weather makes them sweeter. When spring arrives the top growth will take off and quality will start going down as they shift to reproductive mode.

Thinning should be done asap after established sprouting to get radishes that are sizable to eat in the long run. You can eat the tiny things, greens and all though...maybe like a garnish on a salad or toss into a stir fry towards the end.

With long hot dry days they will go to flower/seed and not make yummy radishes, more like stalks I think they like spring/fall better. Maybe with some shading and extra watering they could do better?? I don't know, I'm usually helping grow different types of radish but I do have a small of of Daikon in now too!! The French Breakfast radishes I seeded at the same time are bolting worse than the Daikon, though.

Well, a year has gone by. I took the advice and planted my daikons in the fall after things cooled down. I planted them far enough apart that they did not need thinning. They sprouted well and grew just a little because things cooled down more than I expected. We had a mild winter this year and the radishes did well, without growing hardly at all.

Things are warming up and the tops are starting to grow. I checked the size of the root and they are still only pencil thick. I am trusting that they will thicken up soon. All of this is a surprise to me as other types of radishes grow so fast.

I'll let you know how things go.

Does anyone else have a diakon radish story to tell?

In the huge region of south and east Asia where they are native, these radishes are mostly grown for cooked or fermented use.  I remember seeing whole truckloads of them in India and Bangladesh and wondering what in the world people do with all those radishes!!  They are cooked up in curry, like everything else, and including the greens.  If they are grown with any stress, or in the wrong season, they won't produce much root; but they will still produce greens, and in fact they will produce those greens in less time from seed than just about anything else.  Cooked up, radish greens are comparable with, and interchangeable with, turnip or mustard greens.  I would just plant them whenever and wherever and find out how they grow by trial and error, eating greens the whole time.  I like the greens better than the roots anyway, and often grow them in dense patches and cut the greens off and let them grow back for multiple harvests...

A good question, Jon!
Although I personally don't have experience with daikon (yet!), I've noticed that most winter crops are sown from half July to (first half of) September in the northern hemisphere.
This gives the plants time to sprout, grow and stock energy into the plant itself, in this case the root, before the winter sets in.
Hopefully this season will bring you the results you're looking for. In any case you've grown your own, local, adapted daikon seed already!!

I suspect your roots are as big as they're going to get this time.  Mine put out new leaves at the beginning of the month and then began forming a flower.  I'd already pulled all the big ones by this time anyway, but I got those last little ones up and eaten too (yum).

Like Alder, I love the greens too;  I learned how to cook them as "namul" by watching Korean cooking videos:  boil/simmer till soft, cool in cold water, drain and squeeze out as much liquid as possible (grab a handful and just start squeezing, discarding the water), then season the leaves as desired.  Soy sauce, vinegar and sesame oil are great.  So is any vinaigrette you like.  I can eat a whole bowlful this way!  

My attempt at them last year failed because not enough sun on my balcony.  The maple trees were trimmed though so I'm hoping that between that and a growlight I can get them to grow this time, planted them in early March.  Intending to grow them until they flower and then harvest.  Then I'll try again come August in my new location to do winter possible harvest, or let them go until spring next year.

G Freden wrote:I suspect your roots are as big as they're going to get this time.  Mine put out new leaves at the beginning of the month and then began forming a flower.  I'd already pulled all the big ones by this time anyway, but I got those last little ones up and eaten too (yum).

Like Alder, I love the greens too;  I learned how to cook them as "namul" by watching Korean cooking videos:  boil/simmer till soft, cool in cold water, drain and squeeze out as much liquid as possible (grab a handful and just start squeezing, discarding the water), then season the leaves as desired.  Soy sauce, vinegar and sesame oil are great.  So is any vinaigrette you like.  I can eat a whole bowlful this way!  

Thank you for the namul recipe! I've had daikon radishes in my food forest garden for at least 24 years. They were a mainstay in permaculture philosopher Masanobu Fukuoka's food forest orchard, too. My daikons happily seed themselves and seem to have a life of their own, without much input from me. I don't care much for the roots (usually hard, stringy and bitter) or the greens (I'll have to try the namul recipe), but I do like the young pods, which make a great substitute for regular radishes. I put them in salads and stir fry dishes. Daikon radish sprouts are also powerful "superfoods" packed with vitamins, minerals and anti-cancer compounds. The plants also break up clay soil and attract all kinds of pollinators which love the flowers. Daikons are definitely a plant everyone should have in their food forest.

I've gotten better at daikon over the past few years. We have a chilly winter but can get warm snaps, and I find that to avoid bolting or small roots I need to plant several different "waves" of daikon. I generally don't start til we are quite into fall (we are what, a week into fall right now, but our weather is still warm-- I think about them like peas, don't even plant them til we have sweater weather). Keep in mind I'm zone 9b and don't get snow. In the southern hemisphere here, I'll plant the first batch in mid-may and then sow again every month or so. Once there is any sign of bolting I pull them all.
obviously this depends greatly on the weather. I keep sowing and try to remain optimistic. It is the one thing that I can sow directly in my snail-filled garden that they don't seem to destroy (in fact, none of my huge universe of pests seems to care for daikon).

I eat the greens as pickles or just sauteed greens (or namul, as above), we cook the roots in a million ways, but the first daikon of the winter, grated with some broth ("oroshi daikon") is a seasonal delight for me. Ugly or broken or crooked ones get chopped up and pickled (i make a cheater version of takuan using sugar to "dry" them out, since our winter weather is very humid and drying daikon is simply unviable here). Plus salad, simmered with chicken or kombu seaweed.... a million ways.

Daikons are considered biennials, but they can bolt if they are crowded, too dry or growing in clay.
What you are telling us  about the flavor confirms that they were stressed.
I central Wisconsin, I can do 2 plantings: One in April- May and the other in August-September for a fall crop: they can stand a little frost and for my money, the fall ones taste better, especially after a little frost.
They like deep soil, sandy and damp, and they don't like to be too crowded. 6" in between radishes is good. I plant them in a bed [4'X 8'], respecting the distance in both directions.
I wasn't going for seeds, so I wouldn't let them flower, but it was cool enough that they didn't bolt.

I just bought a pound of forage radishes to grow specifically for the greens.
I like greens wilted in bacon grease, topped with a fried egg.

The roots are hot, like horseradish hot, and
I've never been able to make them taste even decent, short of making a sugar laden pickle, which I still did not like.


I have grown actual daikon radishes as well, sown under tomato plants late in the summer.
They did great, I recommend this as a bed filler, the seeds are cheap and the plants grow quickly.
The roots are milder than red radish, in my experience.

The seedpods are also delicious, like peppery snow pea pods.

William Bronson wrote: I just bought a pound of forage radishes to grow specifically for the greens.
I like greens wilted in bacon grease, topped with a fried egg.

You are making me hungry !!

William Bronson wrote: I just bought a pound of forage radishes to grow specifically for the greens.
I like greens wilted in bacon grease, topped with a fried egg.

The tops are edible? considering how easy they are to grow, I'm going to try them this year!

Alder Burns wrote:Cooked up, radish greens are comparable with, and interchangeable with, turnip or mustard greens.  I would just plant them whenever and wherever and find out how they grow by trial and error, eating greens the whole time.  I like the greens better than the roots anyway, and often grow them in dense patches and cut the greens off and let them grow back for multiple harvests...

Indeed, radish tops in general, and daikon tops in particular, make lovely greens.  I find them best wilted in a pan or broth mixed with other Asian greens.

I can only assume that everyone here describing their daikon bolting before the roots grow, or producing hot-as-horseradish roots, are trying to grow them out of season.  ALL radishes are cool season crops, and daikon are no exception.  Though daikon do take a while longer to grow than the super-fast small radish varieties.  So, planted in early Spring, it's all the more important to get the seed in the ground as soon as possible.

I prefer to plant in the Fall.  I did this for several years in the early establishment phase of my food forest.  I made seedballs and just broadcast them in early-to-mid Fall.  Mostly I considered these as soil improvement, and any crop I harvested was a bonus.  I found they had a strange habit of growing up rather than down.  Maybe it was my clay soil.  By the time they were harvest size - a couple inches in diameter - about half the root was underground and the other half sticking up above the soil.  I would just break them off at the soil line, harvesting the top half and letting the bottom half rot in place!

This growth pattern made a particularly odd visual effect when a hard frost would kill back the greens: I'd be left with a meadow full of strange white knobs.  Usually the greens would regrow, as it takes a LOT of cold to kill a radish.  This is why I recommend Fall planting.  If time is against you, better to be fighting the oncoming cold, which radishes can largely withstand, than to fight the oncoming heat, which will trigger them to bolt.

Unless of course you are interested in harvesting the seed pods, as some here have mentioned.  I am aware of the whole growing-radishes-for-seed-pods thing, but haven't tried it.

Matthew Nistico wrote:
I prefer to plant in the Fall.  

I am in USDA zone 5B, and one of my first experiences with cover cropping was spreading daikon seed in the late fall. I had spectacular germination in the spring and I had more radish than I could deal with! I find Daikon to be rather hardy and resilient in the cold as you were saying.

Matthew Nistico wrote:... growing up rather than down.  Maybe it was my clay soil.  By the time they were harvest size - a couple inches in diameter - about half the root was underground and the other half sticking up above the soil.  

Yes, I have heavy clay and this definitely happens-- although I'm impressed at how deep they can get. And I try to only harvest when the ground is wet, otherwise I'm only getting half a radish!  I take it as one of my signs that it is about time to harvest when they start popping up like that- afterwards they start getting pithy.

Tereza Okava wrote:

Matthew Nistico wrote:... growing up rather than down.  Maybe it was my clay soil.  By the time they were harvest size - a couple inches in diameter - about half the root was underground and the other half sticking up above the soil.  

Yes, I have heavy clay and this definitely happens-- although I'm impressed at how deep they can get. And I try to only harvest when the ground is wet, otherwise I'm only getting half a radish!  I take it as one of my signs that it is about time to harvest when they start popping up like that- afterwards they start getting pithy.

Jumping out of the soil happens in very sandy country as well. I suspect that is just how  daikon radishes are *supposed* to grow. I've grown them as a cover crop in a very small area and also pampered them in the garden with similar results: They popped out and mice & deer liked them.
In the garden, I pampered them more with water and they grew quite large [4.5" in diameter and 9" long, a perfect cylinder] and nice and crisp.
And, Tereza, you are correct about watering them to get them out in one piece. I waited for a rain to soften the ground and used one of those triangular or narrow shovels. [Lowes calls them transfer shovel, I don't see why]. This is Home Depot:
https://www.homedepot.com/p/Bully-Tools-14-Gauge-3-in-Trench-Shovel-with-Fiberglass-Long-Handle-92719/205347970?source=shoppingads&locale=en-US&srsltid=AfmBOopGJ_p9G3lIPK_tGr5c2SyQhR_GYSno2DMTugE8-Ms5AVP6qPVs5X4
I would add a D handle or stirrup handle, though: It's easier on the wrist
A narrow trenching shovel would serve too. Plant it all the way to the hilt, about 3" from the root and bring the handle down.
Then they came out easy.

Well  I planted daikon seeds in a big pot about a month ago and they're growing but slowly, my red radishes are only growing a little faster than they are haha.