[drmoonshine]

hey all whats going on here?

is this some sort of flower or does this happen with every stem? whats that bity stuff i pulled off it?

[LivvyW]

Ive never had one on my rhubarb in 5 years, but i believe it is a flower stalk. I think youll be told just to take it out. No harm done.

[flitwickone]

cut it off straight away or the plant will put all its effort into the flower

after that give it a damn good watering and then some and a good feed would not go amiss

[drmoonshine]

interesting. no this is the first time that i have seen this on mine and mine is god knows how many years old now....

hmmmmmmmm have i ruined the flower now?

does anyone think its worth keeping it on and getting some seeds off it while i have the chance?

edit

this is the plant in question thought i may as well put one up ive already had about 5 stalks pulled off it late last month

[MoreWhisky]

My Rhubarb flowers ever yr , i just cut it off straight away and give good watering as already said. I have lovely rhubarb to! Dont know what variety it is but got used to the flowering now, doesnt seem to hurt the cropping in anyway.

[Aunt Sally]

Some varieties or rhubarb are more prone to flowering than others.

The advice you've been given to cut the flower bud off is what I do.

[digalotty]

everyone seems to have this problem this year i have noticed two plots at our lotty with them flowering maybe it is caused by the early dry spell

[drmoonshine]

ok thank you all for the info i shall pull it off to moz and feed/water well

[Salmo]

There seems to be a lot of flowers on rhubarb this year. My guess would be the very hard weather in December. Early cold spell, dry Spring, warm Spring. We can guess at all of these. Does anybody know?

[prakash_mib]

There seems to be a lot of flowers on rhubarb this year. My guess would be the very hard weather in December. Early cold spell, dry Spring, warm Spring. We can guess at all of these. Does anybody know?

probably combination of all.
last year we had very cold feb/march and dry april/may and the rhubarbs flowered (not all of 'em in our site).
this year we had cold nov/dec and dry march and almost all of them flowered in our site.

[Nikkithefoot]

Rhubarb will flower more readily if it is stressed. This year has been particularly bad, hardish winter (depending on your location), followed by very mild weather, and now quite dry.

Pull out the flower stalks as soon as you see them, water and feed well then carry on gently picking the stalks you want.

[mumofstig]

I never worry about why it's flowering, as long as you know what to do when it does.............there's no problem