leeks

[Crystalmoon]

Hi everyone, Im growing leeks from seeds for the first time. I sowed them in fibre pots & they have grown to about 6 inches long. They still look like blades of grass though & Im sure Ive read on here that they need to be pencil thick before putting them on my allotment.
How long does this take?
Im beginning to think I didnt sow them in deep enough pots to start with  ??? 

[Crystalmoon]

[Robert_Brenchley]

They've got till June or so to thicken up so don't worry. You can always do an intermediate stage and pot them up into something deeper.

[tim]

Can't see that depth matters much?

'Pencil thick' = 1/4". I have never waited that long. But 'now' is a bit early, as Robert suggests?

[Crystalmoon]

I think I may try to move them into deeper pots....they are in pots just over 2 inches deep at the moment with toilet roll insides ontop of the pots. I think Ive got abit confused about the growing techniques for leeks  ??? 

[PurpleHeather]

I use toilet roll tubes. Those nice little cardboard things the paper hangs on.

In fact I use these for so much planting that every one now has orders to keep all the cardboard tubes from all sorts of rolls and I cut them to size.

The fact that they are hollow allows roots to go all the way down and out.

They rot so planting in them with the little babies inside means you do not disturb those little roots when you plant out.

[tim]

May be missing something here, but I see no point in re-potting. If you do, it makes final planting much more difficult, having to dig a hole for the pot.

As to size, I'm happy to plant even smaller & thinner than this.

[Chris Graham]

I have the same problem, happend to me last year too but I planted them out when they were only about as thick as two blades of grass ;)

They took really well but I reccon the initial size when transplanting out to the plot wont matter, as long as you have a lot of organic matter mixed in to the area. 

If I had used "Growmore" and used more compost I probably would have had thicker stems...........pic time  ;)           last year

The size when I transplanted back in May 2007....


The size of them in September 2007....


Could have been bigger.

[cambourne7]

Hi everyone, Im growing leeks from seeds for the first time. I sowed them in fibre pots & they have grown to about 6 inches long. They still look like blades of grass though & Im sure Ive read on here that they need to be pencil thick before putting them on my allotment.
How long does this take?
Im beginning to think I didnt sow them in deep enough pots to start with  ??? 

crystalmoon last year i did not plant mine deep enough so some of them did not have a lot of white on the leek. Trench them up if your worried.

This year i have grown leek from seed tape i dont intend on moving them so i will be trenching soil up them to help develop decent leeks.

Just in case i am going to sow some extra seed today now that the tapes germinated just in case my experiment fails.

[Crystalmoon]

Thanks everyone for all the helpful answers. Guess Im being abit paranoid about doing stuff wrong as its my first time. Im going to concentrate my efforts on getting the final bed ready for the leeks. Think I will create a raised bed for them. I may plant out before they are 'pencil thick' & cover with fleece cloche.   

[tim]

If they are hardened off, they shouldn't need cover.

[Crystalmoon]

Thanks Tim I didnt realise, I'm such a novice! Ha! Ha!

I had a sudden brain wave today & just added some compost to the inside of the toilet rolls, abit like earthing up I suppose, so I dont need to mess about repotting them as they are no-longer all floppy  ;)

I'm seriously going to create a seed bed next year & start my leeks off in the ground on my lottie

[bupster]

Everybody on here does seem to be babying their leeks a bit, they're terribly sturdy and resilient. I never sow leeks or lettuce indoors, they'll do fine out in the ground even if the bed isn't perfect for them. They're idiotproof I think - certainly the only veg I've never had any kind of problem with, even as an absolute newbie (and my god, I was hopeless). And they certainly don't need to be in separate pots or toilet rolls - they grow quite happily to pencil size in clumps, and they don't mind having their roots disturbed - indeed, some of the old boys on my plot cut most of the roots off when transplanting. Don't worry so much with leeks, really, you can't harm them, after a nuclear holocaust there'll be cockroaches the size of sheep and leeks doing fine :)

[jennym]

... Don't worry so much with leeks, really, you can't harm them, after a nuclear holocaust there'll be cockroaches the size of sheep and leeks doing fine :)

Classic!  ;D

So true - wish I had the camera, leek seedlings, sown in autumn (don't ask  :-[)  which are the size of blades of grass have stood on wet heavy clay, with no protection, all winter here, and survived.

[kt.]

They all look better than mine.  I sowed a tray of leeks 3 weeks ago and none are showing. Guess they are lost now.  Oh well.  Such as life. ::)  @%^*$£!

[Robert_Brenchley]

Mine are well up, in a mini-greenhouse, but not yet big enough to prick out. I've just eaten the ones I planted last June after everything was devastated by floods; I got enough for one big pot of jollof, which is something anyway.

[jonny211]

Maybe not KT.... mine took agaes to show as well (Bleu de Solaise), they're still as the blade of grass stage now although most have now developed a second 'leaf' and I sowed in Feb. Bit slow methinks.

[bupster]

Have you done Bleu before? They took ages for me last year (though doing them again as they're so pretty). Trying a couple of heirlooms from Thomas Etty this year too, as well as the old standfast King Richard which are ridiculously early.

[Robert_Brenchley]

I've been growing Bleu for a few years now, and have never had a problem germinating it under cover.

[Eristic]

Mine have been evicted from the polytunnel now that space is getting short. Variety is Bleu de Solaise which I find to be hardy, trouble free and quick to germinate..

 

[Curryandchips]

May be missing something here, but I see no point in re-potting.

I agree. However, for reasons to do with planting space, I sow in a deep pot, then plant out into individual pots (actually two to a pot) to enable them to grow on, until space is available, normally the ground yielded by the first early potatoes, ie about end July. This seems to work for me although if I had more space, I would plant up straight away around now to mid May.