[Benandbill]

I've let some of my spinach go to seed, have planted some of those seeds and seedlings are out in force after just 3 or 4 weeks.  However, someone has told me this isn't such a good idea because the 2nd lot of spinach will go to seed quicker and will not grow as big.

Does anyone concur with this, and if so, does anyone know of any seeds that this is not applicable to?

[sunshineband]

If it was an F1 variety, then the next generation will not come true to type and you will havve all sorts of spinach come up. They will not all be ready at the same time (which could be an advantage of course) and some mght run to seed sooner.

At this time in the year spinach does not usually bolt, so you should be OK for a goodly while for all of your new generation. 

Hope that helps

[Salmo]

With most crops only one or two plants go to seed. If you collect the seed from them you are selecting plants that tend go to seed quickly. With some plants such as sweetcorn or beans this is good. With others such as onions it is not.

I suspect that all your spinach bolts at once and it will make no difference. If it is F1 it will say so on the packet.

[mumofstig]

all plants eventually seed themselves..it's only bolting if it goes to seed much quicker than it should....so did the parent plants bolt or just flower and seed in their normal life-cycle?

If the latter, then there is no problem at all (unless it was an f1 variety as already said)

[Benandbill]

They're either Leaf Beet Perpetual Spinach or Scenic.  I cannot remember which as stupidly, I threw away the packet.  The seeds I've just re-sown came weeks and weeks ago from the spinach I sowed directly into a drill, and the leaves on these plants never grew big, they grew to about 2 ft tall and went to seed.  I put this down to the fact I didn't thin them and just left them close together so they didn't have room to grow big leaves.

The ones I had a decent crop from and have been eating for weeks, had lovely big leaves and are the same variety.  These are only just going to seed now but I potted these on when they were getting big and planted them out individually about a foot apart.

[sunshineband]

The fact they went to seed could be just that spinach sown earlier in the year willl often bolt in poor conditions, regardless of variety.

Imho it is definitely worth the space right now to give them a go, and you sould get somehting to eat fromthe grond that you wouldn't have other wise.

If they run to seed quickly in the spring, then your compost heap will benefit and you might choose to buy anothe packet of seeds  for the next season

[Benandbill]

That definitely sounds encouraging, thanks sunshineband.  I potted them on on Friday anyway, 36 of them into 2x holders of 18 three inch pots.  One's in a cloche with my tray of spring onion seeds that are now just starting to show also, and one is being left outside to see which does better.

Here goes nothing!   

[azubah]

I never have to sow spinach. There are always self seeding plants which come up on my plot all over the place so I dig some up, eat some of the leaves, and leave some of the plants to go to seed. Then I get another lot next year.
The only problem is that they end up anywhere so if you are too tidy it won't work for you.