Two weeks later, I planted them indoors under a grow light. I put my artichoke seeds into the refrigerator on Feb. These two steps should ensure a nice harvest in the summer. When May 1 rolls around, expose the seedlings to two weeks of cool outdoor temperatures. After that, start the seeds indoors just like you normally would. Two weeks before you’d ordinarily start them indoors, refrigerate them inside a small plastic bag of lightly moistened peat moss or seed-starting mix. Next year, if you plan to grow artichokes from seeds, there is an extra step you can take to fool the seeds. ![]() They react to this by producing artichokes in the first year. When May 15 rolls around, plant them in the garden.īelieve it or not, this step “fools” the seedlings into thinking they have been through a winter. You may have to cover them or move them to the garage some nights, but that’s OK. On about May 1, move your plants outdoors to expose them to chilly temperatures for two weeks, but don’t let them get frosted. In this region, it’s usually safe to plant warm-season crops outside around May 15. If you have started artichokes indoors or you intend to purchase plants from a nursery this spring, there is one extra step before transplanting them out into the garden. But if you’d rather eat homegrown artichokes, there is a pretty simple way to get them to produce, a process called “vernalization.” The spiky leaves provide a nice contrast to other plants in the garden. On the bright side, artichoke plants are stunning in the landscape. There’s just one problem with growing them this way: Sometimes the plants might produce artichokes in that short amount of time, but, more often than not, they don’t produce any fruit. Those of us living in zones 5 and 6 have to grow them as annuals by starting the plants in the spring knowing they’ll die at the end of the growing season when it gets really cold. That means they come back year after year. It just requires fooling them a bit.įor a long time, I’ve been envious of gardeners in USDA hardiness zones 7 to 11 because they can grow artichokes as perennials. If you love eating artichokes, you’ll be happy to hear that growing them in Inland Northwest gardens is doable.
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