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Friday 19 August 2022

Leek

Last year we grew leeks from seed for the first time, quite successfully.

One leek, however, was too small and weedy to pick, so we left it in the garden where it survived the winter.

This year it grew too quickly to pick, and sent up a four-foot high shoot with a globe topped by a long spike. It remained like that for weeks. The other morning we were surprised to see the globe and spike had split and were left dangling beneath a rather spectacular flower.

The insects seem to like it too.

26 comments:

  1. They are great aren't they? We used to leave an onion or two for their flowers as well. Great food for pollinators.

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  2. Similar to chives but on a different scale. I always leave my chives to flower as I like the look of them, and the bees love them too.

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  3. That is beautiful, worth growing them just for the flower especially if the bees love them. Briony
    x

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    1. Evidently, they taste awful after they've flowered, but somewhere I read they then put up lots of little shoots which can either be used as baby leeks or taken off to plant in rows for leeks next year.

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  4. Wow. That is a pretty amazing flower. Floral fireworks!

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    1. I would have watered it if I'd realised how it would turn out. For weeks it was just a kind of green globe.

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  5. That is a lovely flower surprise.

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  6. Leave it alone and see if the flower sets seeds once the petals die off. You may get lucky and have a bounty of leeks from that one.

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    1. We've still got half a packet of seeds left, but could try these selk seeded ones.

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  7. Beautiful! I love allium flowers, too.

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    1. Didn't realise they were alliums, but they're certainly smelly enough to be.
      Comments issues continue - this went into spam.

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  8. I have never knowingly seen a flowering leek. It was worth leaving it.

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    1. Me neither. They are peculiar but rather stunning.

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  9. Wow! I had no idea a leek would create such a flower, though it does look something like the ornamental blossoms from the allium family.

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    1. Meike says they are alliums. The flower has grown bigger during the last week - they photograph was on the day it suddenly appeared.

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  10. Are they seeds?

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    1. It's a multiflora flower head which will eventually turn to seed, and we grew them from seed.

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  11. Replies
    1. Comments and spam issues abound. On yours and one or two others, I now have to click a button labelled "log in with your Google account" before I can comment.

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  12. Very cool. I've never planted leaks, but used to leave some green onions to winter and they would produce shoots and actually seed themselves. Popped in from a mutual friends blog, it's always fun to meet new bloggers. Hope you'll swing by for a visit.

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    1. Thanks for taking a look. It was only last year we wondered what else could we grow rather than the usual runner beans, courgettes and tomatoes especially as we don't need so many now the kids are rarely here. The leeks were moderately successful, so we're trying again this year.

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  13. Life is full of surprises, flowering leeks one of them.

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