I would like opinions on this new variety, Colorado Star, bred for northern climates. I have never found any artichoke transplants around this area, even in niche market sales.
I forgot about the Imperial Star seeds I started for this past season. It would have been a great year to grow artichokes with the exnteded warm weather in the midwest.
- Lisa
Quote:
Originally Posted by bitterwort
Lisa, my Imperial Star did not get to supermarket size, but I didn't expect them to from the catalog description offered. Since we're in Minnesota, not California, I thought it was great to get any--and they made quite a few nice smaller buds. From other things I've read, the bud size increases the second and following years--so if I lived in a milder climate, I might be tempted to cover them over heavily with straw and trying to overwinter them that way. I haven't had any luck so far in digging the roots and getting them to overwinter in a cool spot in the house.
As far as feeding them, I added a lot of compost to the bed and threw in a good handful of 10-10-10 granular fertilizer in the planting hole. Then I hit them with liquid fertilizer (probably the blue stuff) throughout the season. They made a nice flush of buds early in the season; then sulked in the midsummer heat before getting going again as the temperatures eased off. The plants themselves were never over a couple feet or so tall and they didn't take up as much room as I expected.
I'm trying Colorado Star, a purple annual variety, from Johnny's this year as well as Imperial Star.
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