Broccoli

Friday 30 December 2011

Broccoli is one of the premier crops in Galena. It grows very well and seemingly shrugs off everything thrown at it - heat, cold, rain, endless sunshine. Some varieties don't do so well, however. Some grow spectacularly well.

Summer 2011

Arcadias again did very, very well. Also coming along nicely was the Green Magic variety from Vesey's Seeds. This was the first brocolli picked, on July 23. The Romanesco, as usual, gave me big leaves and no heads. We also discovered that it is possible just to store the brocolli in the root cellar by letting the heads sit there in the tray. The closer packed the flowers on the head, the better, by the way. I'm going to store more next year. Bombs: Green Goliath and Umpqua.

Summer 2010

This year we grew several varieties - Everest, Calabrese, Arcadia, Marathon, Early Dividend, Romanesco. As usual, Arcadia was the superior variety for Galena - huge heads, some more than one foot across, and superb side shoot production. Marathon and Early Dividend put out some good growth, too. Everest? Not the pinnicle of success here in Galena. Some smaller heads and that's it. Calabrese was just awful - most of them didn't even develop heads. The Romanesco grew and grew, creating enormous leaves, and no heads at all. This was very different from other years, where this variety did moderately well.

Previous seasons

We've always had broccoli. We used to grow a variety called Green Comet, from Japanese seeds, which I've had a hard time finding. It grew very well. The quintessential nursery variety Pacman has never done well for me.