Kitchen Garden Forum

Help oh wise 'persons', some of my autumn planted shallots and winter planted leeks,have started to go to seed, should I pick the rest, the shallot leaves have not turned brown as yet. Why is this happening? how can I be more careful in future?
Thanks in advance

Jeanne

I think you've planted them at the wrong time, Jeanne. These plants are biennial, which means they grow one year and flower the next year. The shallots have been through a winter, so they think it's their second year and so they're flowering. The leeks are the same. It's maybe a little early for leeks to flower, but they're also probably thinking it's summer with all the dry, warm weather we're having.
The right time for planting shallots would be late winter. You would normally sow leeks in the spring, then put them in their growing positions in early summer. They both then grow through the year. You harvest shallots in late summer/early autumn, and leeks during the winter and early spring.

From reports a lot of people all over the country are having the same problem, this long warm dry spell has caused the plant to become stressed and when a plant is stressed the first thought in its head is "I am going to die I had better reproduce" therefore your onions/leeks are flowering, just nip the flowering points out and give them a bit more water onions have shallow roots and dry out quickly.

There are your answers, Jeanne

I understand that you live in South West France. When do local people plant their shallots and leeks usually? I guess it might be rather different from UK.

As for what to do. There is nothing you can do with the ones already going to seed except eat them. Pinching out the seed head will do no good as the hard stalk has aleady formed all the way through the bulb/stem. As for the rest, keep them well watered as Paul says.

Alan

Thanks all, that is very useful, I will do as you suggest. I have done as the neighbours have done, in fact was given the leeks to plant by one of them, unfortunately unlike yourselves we have had miserable weather here in the Tarn, grey skies since before Easter, we had a short break of 10 days when temperatures went to 30 deg, we then went back to grey skies until today, we saw the sun. I felt like falling to my knees in awe, but alas, like all gardeners the weather is never just right, it soon became too hot, and I had to shade my newly planted plants with newspaper. Again very many thanks until the next time.

Jeanne

a couple of my overwintered onions have done this too. I have nipped out the flowering stem, but should I just dig them up and eat them, and leave the rest for a bit longer to mature?

BUMP - I would love to know about the flowering onions too. Anyone know the answer?

With shallots and onions I've noticed you can tell when they're thinking about putting up a flower stalk because the leaves turn sort of tubular, or curl in on themselves. I spotted it during the hot spell this year and gave them a heavy watering but I still found half a dozen went ahead and flowered. We've had a deluge since then which will hopefully prevent any more going over. I suspect the moral of this story is that when you do have a spell where you have to run up and down your rows with a watering can it's the newly planted youngsters you worry about and it's easy to overlook the mature plants which look as if they're doing OK (I'm usually fed up watering by the time I get to them anyway aren't you?) C'est la vie.

Although I don't grow onions, I've noticed many people on our allotment have got onions going to seed. So far none of my Jeremor shallots have suffered.

Is this mainly becuase the onions dried out too much during the warm weather in April?


Colin

Could be, could be.

All around me on the site other people's onions have gone to seed and all appear to be sets that were planted in the autumn.

This happened to me three years in succession and this year I have only planted onions grown from seed, none have which are bolting.

Fingers crossed.

This is interesting. I planted some (unwins) onion sets at the end of last year hoping to overwinter them, and allowed 20+ weeks for them to grow. I dug them up a few days ago (after about 22-24 weeks not sure exactly) and they just seem to have grown into large spring onions! I was so disappinted with the result, but I need the space for other plants waiting in pots - so hopefully I'll have more luck with these.

Do I have to wait until the autumn before I can try again?

My experience mirrors that of Chantal, I have used sets very year and put up with a percentage of losses to 'going to seed'. This time I have sown Golden Bear seed and they are bulbing up nicely so to the reds, Brunswick I think. I will definately try them again rather than sets next year.