- Chives: origin and properties
- Chive Garlic Varieties
- Sow Garlic
- Propagating chives
- Caring for chives
- Winter chives
- Harvesting and preserving chives
- Using chives
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Growing chives in the garden is easy and promising. We reveal what you have to consider when sowing chives and how to harvest them correctly.
Chive Garlic (Allium tuberosum) is the perfect herb for those who don't want to miss the aromatic taste of garlic, but don't want the strong smell. Because chives do not leave a typical garlic smell in the mouth or on the fingers. In addition, the herb is extremely easy to care for and thrives not only in the garden bed, but also in a pot on the windowsill or in the balcony box. The plant can be used well in the kitchen and is also beautiful to look at, as it forms fine, white flowers all summer long, which have a delicate fragrance. In this article we will tell you everything about the origin, correct sowing, care, propagation, harvesting and use of chives.
Chives: origin and properties
Chive garlic is also called garlic chives (garlic), Chinese chives or Chinese leek and belongs to the leek plant genus (Allium). It is thus closely related to chives (Allium schoenoprasum), leeks (Allium porrum) or onions (Allium cepa ). The aromatic herb probably originally came from China, but it grows wild in most parts of tropical Asia. Today chives are cultivated and highly valued almost all over the world.
In terms of appearance and growth, chives are very similar to chives. The stalks are a bit wider and larger overall. It is a perennial, herbaceous plant that can grow up to 80 centimeters in height. It forms onions-like, small tubers that are white. The culms are flat, 1.5 to 8 millimeters wide and green. The star-shaped, white umbels bloom from June to September and attract numerous insects.
Chive Garlic Varieties
When choosing a variety of chives, you can basicallydo nothing wrong. The varieties differ mainly in the growth height and the thickness of the stalks. A small variety overview gives you an idea of which varieties are worth growing:
- ‘Fat Leaf’: As the name suggests, the culms are wide and thick
- ‘Kiss me’: Particularly wide stems
- 'Knolau': Up to 50 centimeters high, vigorous
- ‘Monstrosum’: Up to 80 centimeters high
- 'Neko': Forms flat, broad culms with a delicate aroma
- ‘Pink Garlic’: As the name suggests, it has pink flowers and broad, juicy leaves
- 'Sapras': High yielding and aromatic
- 'Shiva': grows up to 30 centimeters high, is very vigorous and productive
- 'Wagner's Kobold': Thin, aromatic stems
Sow Garlic
To grow chives, sowing is of course the first step. We will answer when, where and how best to sow chives in the following sections.
The right place for chives
The herb from China feels right at home both in the garden bed and in the pot. It thrives best in a full sun to sunny location. It is ideal when the plant is in full sun for half the day, but it can also just about cope with partially shaded locations. Chives, on the other hand, do not want to be completely in the shade. The soil should be rich in humus and rich in nutrients. In addition, the tasty herb loves evenly moist soil. However, it cannot cope with waterlogging.
Where to sow chives?
- Full sun to sunny location
- Soil rich in humus and rich in nutrients
- Evenly moist
- No waterlogging
Tip: Good plant neighbors for chives are tomatoes (Solanum lycopersicum), cucumbers (Cucumis sativus ), carrots (Daucus carota subsp. sativus) or strawberries (Fragaria). It does not get along well with legumes such as peas (Pisum sativum) and beans (Phaseolus vulgaris) or with cabbages such as white cabbage ( Brassica oleracea convar. capitata var. alba).
How to plant chive seeds
The chives can be sown either in pots under glass, on the windowsill or later, directly outdoors. The best time to start with thePrefer to start is from the end of March. You can then plant the young plants in the garden bed from mid-May. Direct sowing in the bed can be done from April to August.
When to sow chives?
- Pull forward from the end of March
- Plant early plants outdoors from mid-May
- From April to August outdoors
Growing in seed pots on the windowsill or under glass has the advantage that you can start sowing earlier and thus harvest the first delicious stalks faster. For sowing, we recommend our Plantura organic herb soil, which is perfectly tailored to the requirements of chives and offers the herb the best conditions for ideal growth.
Sow the chives in the pot:
- Sowing soil like the Plantura Organic Herb & Seed Soil
- Fill the seed pot with soil
- Planting distance: 30 x 25 cm
- Cover with 1 cm layer of soil
- Cast on
- Germination period: 14 - 28 days
- Ideal germination temperature: 18 - 20 °C
- Keep evenly moist
- After the seed has germinated, separate if necessary
When the early plants are big enough and the planters are fully rooted, it's time to plant the chives. This can be done either in the garden bed or in the pot.
Alternatively, you can sow your chives directly outdoors. To do this, simply follow the instructions below:
- Prepare the bed: loosen the soil well, remove weeds
- Enrich the soil with a natural fertilizer with a long-term effect, such as our Plantura organic universal fertilizer, or ready-made compost
- Create seed furrows
- Seed depth: 2 cm
- Row spacing: 30 - 40 cm
- Planting distance: 25 cm
- Cover seed with soil
- Water well
- Keep well moist until seed sprout
Propagating chives
You can easily multiply chopped garlic yourself. The easiest and most promising way to do this is by division.
Propagating chives by division at a glance:
- Plants must be at least 3 years old for division
- In spring or in autumn
- Dig up Garlic Plant
- Plant by hand in 2 or 3Divide Parts
- Carefully detach parts from each other (use garden shears or spade if necessary)
- Plant
- Water well
Caring for chives
Caring for chives naturally includes watering and fertilizing. The delicious herb likes it evenly moist, which is why you should always check the soil and water it if necessary. It is also important to keep the bed in which the chives are growing free of weeds. This is achieved through regular weeding or through a mulch layer or undersowing. It is best to fertilize with a fertilizer with a natural long-term effect, alternatively with compost. These two sources of nutrients are sustainable and provide your plant with everything it needs to grow over the long term.
Tip: You only have to apply our Plantura organic universal fertilizer twice a year: once in the spring shortly after budding and again during the main growth phase, for example in June .
How do I care for chives?
- Keep evenly moist
- Remove weeds by weeding, mulching or undersowing
- Fertilize in spring and June
- Use fertilizer with a long-term effect, such as our Plantura organic universal fertilizer, or compost
Winter chives
Quite a few gardeners are probably wondering: Are chives hardy? The simple answer to this question is a resounding yes. Chives are perennial. Overwintering chives is therefore not a problem. Temperatures down to minus 20 °C do not bother the herb. In the spring it will sprout again all by itself and you will enjoy the popular kitchen herb for many years.
How do I overwinter chives?
- Chive garlic is perennial
- Winter hardy down to -20 °C
Harvesting and preserving chives
A great advantage of chives: they can be used almost all year round.
When and how do I harvest chives?
- Harvest time: spring to autumn
- Chive garlic in a pot on the windowsill can even be harvested all year round
- Use scissors or a sharp knife for harvesting
- Cut stems 2 finger widths above the ground
- The flowers of the chive garlic are also edible and can be harvested
Tip: The more radically you cut back your chives, the stronger they will sprout again afterwards.
Once your chives have been harvested, they unfortunately only stay fresh for two to three days. It can be kept in a glass with water or in the vegetable compartment of the refrigerator. It is therefore advisable to only harvest as much as can be used fresh. Of course, you also have various options for preserving the herb. For example, you can freeze your chives very easily. Other methods include pickling in s alt or in vinegar and oil. Chopped garlic also lasts a long time as a pesto and also tastes great. However, drying chives is not highly recommended. It loses almost all of its flavor as it dries.
Storing and preserving chives at a glance:
- At best, only harvest as much fresh as can be used
- Put fresh stalks in a glass of water
- Alternatively, wrap in a damp kitchen towel and store in the vegetable compartment of the refrigerator
- Preserving chives by freezing
- Pick in S alt
- As pesto
- Pick in oil and vinegar
- Chives are not suitable for drying
Using chives
For those who don't know the herb that well, this question may arise: How do I actually use chives? Chopped garlic can be used in many ways in the kitchen: it tastes good in herb quark, in salads, in soups, for seasoning and refining hearty dishes or as decoration and for serving dishes. Or simply try fresh chives on a delicious piece of buttered bread. The small onions can be steamed and used like spring onions. The chive garlic blossoms are also edible. You can enjoy them, for example, as a decoration or in salads. The best thing about chives: unlike real garlic, the herb leaves no odor in your mouth. And finally, the question: is chives he althy? It contains a lot of the substance allicin - as well as in other leek plants. Allicin strengthens the immune system against bacteria and viruses and is also said to help lower blood sugar levels.
If you prefer real garlic, here are some tips and tricks for growing garlic in your own garden.