Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Artichoke Blooms

Earlier this year we were enjoying the artichokes from the garden that were from a plant that had been growing about a year and a half. They were tasty and meaty, however there are only five or six blooms a season so we planted a couple more plants. They are perennials with attractive foliage so as usual they were mixed in the flower beds. Unfortunately the two new plants gave us lots of produce, but they did not meet our expectations. There was very little tough "meat" on them and when I went through the trouble of stuffing them I was very disappointed. I am not sure if it was they type of artichoke or the fact that they were new, younger plants, but I decided to let them bloom out and wait for next year's crop. The bees love the flowers and they are very showy in the flower bed!

4 comments:

Michelle Legler said...

I like to let some of my artichokes bloom too. The flowers are so unusual, but lovely!

Michelle

Anonymous said...

Wow! I didn't realize they get such a lovely bloom on them. I'm a novice veggie gardener. I did hear that it takes a couple of years for them to get established and produce the "meat" on them needed. You are inspiring me to want to plant some.

Heather said...

The bloom on those is spectacular! I have not seen the actual blossom before!

Anonymous said...

I'd never seen an artichoke bloom before either -- they're huge, and lovely.