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When to harvest broccoli!? First time growing
In Vegetable Gardening

When to harvest broccoli!? First time growing

These are two different ones. All of my others are way smaller. When to harvest? No banana for scale 😔

by SunnySpot69

22 Comments

  3. jh937hfiu3hrhv9

    Cut down to only a couple nodes remaining and side shoots can make more smaller heads.

  4. pikinhos1995

    Damn, I wish mine looked like that 😍😍

  5. Unusual-Ad-6550

    Harvest right this very minute. That is prime

  6. Extreme-Fall-9963

    Now!! Harvest them both. Great job. đŸ‘đŸ»

  8. TheBlegh

    Feel the tightness of the head, as soon as you can feel some looseness, harvest. Itll take a few days before it’s fully gone to flower and its too late. You can harvest immediately and wait for the smaller heads to develop. Use those smaller ones to experiment with figuring out how loose is too lose.

    You will need to check it in the morning and the afternoon to ensure you dont miss your window. Thats my experience growing it last season In South African autumn to early winter.

  11. StreetSyllabub1969

    Those are ready now. We grew 5 nice heads this year, the first time in over 10 years of trying we ever had full sized ones like yours.

  12. EdwinGBrown

    I’ve noodled around with broccoli and it does seem like soon after this size, the broccoli gets loose and bolts. So how do farmers get the really big heads of broccoli?

  13. Rough-Front-1578

    Better to pick it smaller. That shit bolts in the blink of an eye and becomes tough and bitter

  15. Vast-Combination4046

    This is the gamble stage, but it probably won’t get bigger before it opens

  18. Altruistic-Rope-6523

    If you don’t take it now something else will

  19. tlbs101

    You can wait until you see the slightest hint of yellow in some of the flower buds. IMO it’s still a few days too small.

  20. insufficient_funds

    My opinion is if it starts to look like the head is loosening up (like right now it’s all tightly packed together and if you feel it, it’s firm like all one piece; at some point it will start getting loose) then you’re a few days late.

    Once you have a head you can harvest it at any point, it’s just a matter of how much patience you have for letting it get bigger

  21. Shermiebear

    “Sunny”, the decision on when to harvest should several factors into consideration.
    1.) Variety maturation time
    2.) Weather / temperatures
    If your variety matures in 75 days and your past that date by more than 10 days harvest no matter what the size is.
    If the weather continues to be warm with above average temperatures, go ahead and harvest.
    Broccoli heads will remain tight and compact up to 7 days before the head begins to loosen and the individual buds begin to separate from the head. From the picture your’s looks ready to pick, if you let it go much longer the head will begin to yellow and split apart as the head begins to go to seed.
    When in doubt, err on the side of caution and harvest.

  22. substandardpoodle

    In case nobody said it: there’s a reason why Asian grocery stores don’t sell “broccoli crowns“. It’s because the best part of broccoli is the stem. Just slice it small and steam it. And if it has thick bark on it you can hit it with a potato peeler.

    Also: the leaves are totally edible. They’re very pretty in soup.

    Edit: I should have said “the stems and stalk“ both taste much sweeter than the flower buds Americans grew up eating