Allium Seedheads

I have tonight cut the heads of my alliums as they are mainly brown and look very dry.

Can I use the seeds to grow new ones and if so, how should I do this please?

 

I thought about this myself too !! Reckon it would take a while?

 

Hi Jupes. Yes you can. The best way is to sow them in late autumn in a deepish pot, put in a polythene bag, and leave outside over winter. The bag is just to keep leaves and stray seeds out.

They will germinate very easily in the spring - but need the cold spell. The reason for the deepish pot is so that you can leave them in the same pot for 2 or 3 years. But a word of warning, they will take about 4 if not 5 years to flower.

I have been growing batches of Allium christophii for the last three years or so, and they bulk up very slowly. So far none of mine have flowered yet. Don't disturb them when they are growing - ie have green leaves. But in the summer they will go dormant, and it does no harm to dig them up and have a look.

 

Thanks Peter. I cannot see me having the patience to wait 4 or 5 years for flowers :o, so I think I will resort to Plan B which is buy more bulbs!!

 

I understand that Jupes. I probably wouldn't have tried them if I had known at the time how long they took.

But you can just sow them somewhere and forget about them. I have done that with some seeds. You start a pipeline, eventually every year you put a couple of things into the pipeline and a couple of different things things come out the other end and start flowering.