Last edited on November 02, 2026. View history
Bull's Blood Beet
A variety of beet
How to sow bull's blood beet: Direct seed into soil. Thin to 7cm apart when seedlings are 5cm tall.
Sun requirement for bull's blood beet: Plant in Full Sun
A dark red beetroot selected for the darkest leaves, which can be eaten raw when young or cooked when older. Very sweet roots. Selected in 1840 in the Netherlands by the seedsman Kees Sahin from the French variety Crapaudine. Scatter sow in trays under 3 mm of seed-raising mix and transplant 4 to 6 weeks later at 15 cm diagonal spacing. Leaves are edible at about 35 days and roots at about 55 days. A good-quality seed-raising mix avoids black spots and rotting leaves.
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Bull's blood beet facts
Lifespan
Crop cycle
Optimal light
What are growing degree days?
A plant grows with warmth, not with days. A growing degree day is one day's worth of useful warmth: how many degrees the day's average temperature is above the lowest temperature the crop grows at. Add them up from planting and you know how far along the crop is, whatever the calendar says.
Say that lowest temperature is 10°C. A day averaging 17°C gives 7 growing degree days. A day averaging 8°C gives none, as it is too cold for the crop to grow. That is why the same lettuce takes about 50 days in a summer and 90 in an autumn: it needs the same total warmth either way.
For bull's blood beet, the FAO EcoCrop database gives a lowest growing temperature of 4°C and a shortest growing cycle of 160 days at its best temperature, about 2560 growing degree days to a first harvest.
Where you've told us where your garden is, we use this and the weather there to predict when your bull's blood beet will be ready to harvest. We don't use it for how long a plant lives or when it finishes: we go by what members have logged for that.
Growing bull's blood beets
- Dig the bed fine and stone free 1 week before sowing
- Water regularly at sowing every week
- Thin the seedlings 3 weeks after sowing
- Weed between the rows 4 weeks after sowing every 2 weeks
- Start pulling young beets at first harvest
- Lift the rest of the crop 6 weeks after first harvest
Plant bull's blood beets with
collard greens
passion fruit
sweet potato
spring onion
watermelon radish
Video
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Time to harvest
If sown now, expect a first harvest in about 160 to 240 days.
From the growing cycle in the FAO EcoCrop database, which is the same wherever it is grown.
Ecological requirements
Data from the FAO EcoCrop database for Beta vulgaris L.
| Family / Taxonomy | Magnoliopsida Caryophyllidae Caryophyllales Chenopodiaceae |
|---|---|
| Killing temperature | growth: 0 °C, rest: -3 °C |
| Life form | herb |
| Life span | biennial |
| Habit | acaulescent (or rosette plants) |
| Optimal soil depth | medium (50-150 cm) |
| Optimal soil texture | heavy, medium |
| Optimal soil fertility | high |
| Optimal soil drainage | well (dry spells) |
| Optimal soil salinity | low (<4 dS/m) |
| Photoperiod | long day (>14 hours) |
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