So far so good on the jerusalem artichokes: as you can see from the pic, they are pushing skywards and beginning to produce some buds. The plan is to leave them be until autumn then cut the stems back to 12 inches and dig the tubers up.
They need very little attention now - just a bit of weeding and feeding. They're quite an attractive plant and the flowers are rather jolly too, so like the cardoon this would make a good space filler for the back of a large herbaceous border, with the added bonus of a harvest at the end of the summer. The only potential snag is that the tubers are tricky to remove completely from the soil, so any stragglers could hang around year after year.
These are much akin to horseradish ... once in the garden it stays in the garden. Am interested in recipes for them. They always sound like such a good idea.
Posted by: David | July 17, 2005 at 02:45 AM