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| The beautiful Artichoke flower is attractive to honey bees. |
Artichokes
... are they vegetables or landscape plants? Actually, they can be both. Many
people are surprised to find out that the prickly, yet tasty vegetable can also
make an outstanding drought-tolerant addition to the landscape.
The
plant itself has a coarse, "ferny" look to it, and grows in a
somewhat fountain-like form to about four feet high and six to eight feet wide,
with silvery green leaves. The plant sends up a stalk with a large flower bud
on the top. Eventually, flower buds start appearing as side shoots as well.
These are the vegetables we eat, if picked while they are still closed and
firm.
A
beautiful surprise is in store if you allow the flowers to fully develop and
open. The thistle-like flowers are a spectacular purple-blue color about six
inches across. According to Sunset's Western Garden Book, if cut just before
they fully open, they make great cut flowers for floral arrangements. And, as
it turns out, the local honeybees love the flowers, too.
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| The Artichoke plant I planted last year growing back after winter dormancy. |
A
few years ago I planted a couple of artichoke plants in my vegetable garden.
Since I love both the vegetable and the flower, I picked the first few
artichokes to eat and left the rest to produce flowers. Since I failed to fence
in the original plants, which allowed my chickens to devour both of them, I
planted a new one last spring and two more yesterday.
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| One of the new Artichoke plants that I installed yesterday. |
In
our zones of the High Desert, many people grow the perennial artichoke (Cynara
scolymus) as an annual. But with a little care and mulching, they can come back
year after year.
Now
is the time to be planting artichokes, which can be purchased as dormant roots
or as containerized plants in the winter and early spring. I noticed they were
readily available as containerized plants at our local garden centers a couple
of days ago.
Choose
a location that gets full sun, and then plant them so the buds or shoots are
just above the soil level. Space the plants about four to six feet apart,
although I crowded mine together at about two feet apart – I may regret it
later!
If
you are growing them as a vegetable, water them deeply about once or twice a
week. If grown for ornamental or landscape use, they will tolerate much less
water and go through a period of summer dormancy.
To
encourage a second crop, cut the flower stalk to about an inch from the soil – in
no time, the plant will be producing more artichokes.
If
aphids show up as the flower buds begin to appear, wash them off with strong
blasts of water. If gophers are a problem, plant the artichokes in a raised bed
with hardware cloth on the bottom, or plant in large containers.
When
it starts to get cold, and the leaves begin to turn yellow, cut the leaves to
about one foot high, tie them together over the crown, and mulch heavily to
protect from frost.
So
whether you like to eat artichokes or not, they can be a great plant to enjoy
in any sunny part of the landscape or vegetable garden.
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