If you manage to cultivate the prickly noble plant in your garden, you will benefit from its external beauty and valuable ingredients. The artichoke has a cholesterol-lowering, detoxifying and stimulating effect. Under ideal growth and location conditions, you can admire the flowers for 3, 4 or even 5 years and enjoy their fruits.
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Location and artichoke plants
Artichokes love a warm, sunny and sheltered location. As deep roots, they prefer loose, nutrient-rich and humus-rich soil. Artichokes can be grown on the windowsill or planted outside as direct sowing. If you want to harvest artichokes in the same year, you should start with the in February sowing start. It is best to sow three seeds per seed tray and only cultivate the strongest plants. The ideal germination temperature is between 20 and 25 degrees. In mid-May, you can grow the artichoke plants outdoors at a distance of 60 centimeters.
Variety selection according to regional climate
In order for an artichoke to be grown successfully, a variety should be selected that can withstand the regional climate. The purple artichoke, for example, is extremely sensitive to rain and loves the sun. The robust variety “Große von Laon”, on the other hand, can withstand cold and damp weather. The most famous artichoke varieties:
Large from Laon - edible, cold tolerant, proven variety
Kardy - edible, cold-tolerant and richly flowering ornamental artichoke
Orlando F1 - edible, tasty and thornless artichoke
Madrigal F1 - edible, medium early and large budded variety
Harvest time from the 2nd age
From the 2nd You can harvest your artichokes from summer to late autumn. The fruits are ripe as soon as the outer leaves open. Then it is harvest time, because the edible soil becomes inedible when the artichoke blossoms. So remove the flower heads before they bloom. Both the flower base and the calyx leaves are considered a delicacy worldwide.
Hibernate artichokes safely
If the artichoke leaves turn yellow in late autumn, cut back the long flower stalks and loosely tie the leaves together. The runners remain on the hive for division in spring. A layer of straw with an additional fleece cover offers optimal winter protection. To avoid moisture damage, uncover the plants again in April.
Tips & Tricks
Do you want to safely overwinter your artichoke? Then take the plant and its roots out of the ground and store it in a box of sand in the basement at 15 ° degrees.
