The picture of this year's leeks caught someone's eye, with the question: what is the secret to growing good leeks?
Leeks are pretty hardy and don't need much cossetting but they will appreciate a well-drained soil with organic matter added such as well-rotted manure or garden compost. If there is one thing you can do for your leeks it is to feed them well!
Often gardeners like to buy their leek plants in the spring for planting out, but they are also very easy to start off from seed, either in 3" pots indoors in March or in small seed beds outdoors. Sowing indoors means the leeks can get off to an early start, and make the most of the growing season.
They can then be planted out in rows when conditions are good.
This year, I had four different varieties chosen to provide a succession for harvesting. The early one, Bulgarian Giant, is just about all gone now. It provides quite slender but very tasty leeks during late summer/ autumn while you are waiting for the standard varieties to bulk up.
The variety, Jolant, was supposed to come next but they failed to germinate.The next two are ones I haven't grown before: Neptune is following on for November but the most impressive results have been from some free trial seed from D T Browns and this is the F1 Stocky.
Just how hardy they are over winter remains to be seen! Leeks will happily take frost but our winters here can be a bit more of a challenge.
If conditions do deteriorate and we get severe frosts, it is probably worth lifting any remaining leeks and keeping them in a bucket in a shed - they will store quite well like this for several weeks.