Going to Seed with Dan Brisebois

Patience and hardiness. That’s what chicory is all about.

Last fall we planted out a bed of Chicory and covered it with a mini-tunnel to see if that would be enough to get it through the winter. 

(We usually dig up our Chicories and put them in a cold room for the winter – but I’m getting tired of that and have been looking for an easier way.)

In mid April, when we removed the plastic from the tunnel we discovered that only 6 out of 240 plants had survived the winter.

I had a secret hope that some of the plants still had living roots and would emerge.

Over the next couple weeks, a few more plants emerged from the ground. We had 10 survivors now. But that was it.

Here’s one of those survivors

I felt two feelings

Disappointment – 10/240 is not a great survival rate. It didn’t feel like this was the secret easy way to overwinter chicory.

Excitement – 10 had survived!!! Maybe these 10 plants were a little hardier than the others. If we save their seed, will their offspring have more winter survival next year?

So we dug up the 10 plants and planted them somewhere else. And we put the empty bed on the list to incorporate and then sow a cover crop.

But with all the other spring things on the ToDo list, we’ve not yet incorporated that bed and it has become a mess of weeds and …

???? ???? ???? ???? ????

When I passed by that weedy bed yesterday, I felt a third feeling – JOY!

I discovered dozens of chicory had emerged from the ground.4 weeks after I had given up all hope.

And that’s this picture!

Now we need to decide whether to transplant these individuals elsewhere or go in and do a little weeding …

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My next free online workshop is on Thursday June 16 at 2pm Eastern …

More details coming soon!