Running to seed in mortals has an unfortunate negative connotation and (unfairly) used to be applied mainly to athletic and manly men whose middle years led them to sad decline and debauchery; grubby ties and spreading paunches.
Our rocket is running to seed. I have culled a good harvest of salad leaves and it is now time to allow it to flower and set seed. The flowers are a pale yellow with darker veins, four petals arranged in a cross formation, showing its relation to mustard, faintly scented and ready for visiting hoverflies to land and gather nectar. I'm still watering it in this hot weather, but later will let it dry out completely and the seed pods will turn from green to brown. Then it will be time to store them in a paper bag ready to sow for next year's crop.
It is the same with our coriander, showing a mass of flowerets like cow parsley, also pollinated by delicate hoverflies of all sizes. Inside on the kitchen windowsill my husband keeps successionally sowing more coriander and basil as the summer progresses.
In two flowerpots I have sown red kale (last year's packet) in the hope that when the time comes to take up the rocket I will have a dozen or so young plants for the winter season. So our cycle of sowing and harvesting continues.
No comments:
Post a Comment