Perennial kale

[malterod]

One of my favorite perennial vegetables are perennial kales.

I’ve grown some named varieties for some years, esp. an old French variety ‘Daubenton’ which is very bushy (many side-shots), tends to root where the side-shoots fall and thus clones itself. The variety rarely flowers, which stresses the plant less. The primary way this has died for me has been in winter frosts at our cold and wet nursery site (zone 7). In the city (almost two climate zones higher, zone 9, and much more well-draining), it can reliably overwinter.

The last 4-5 years I’ve grown a diverse population of perennial kale originally from Chris Homanics Homesteader’s Kaleidoscopic Perennial Kale. This population has a lot color variation, esp. purples from Purple Tree Collard, and most plants flower prolifically but still survive. My favorite thing to eat on kales are the flower shoots at the brocollini stage. I’m on the third generation adapting it to my climate.

My criteria are fairly simple:

• winter hardiness is first priority.
• bushy growth habit (rooting where side shoots hit soil)
• perenniality

Later I want to pay more attention to:

• more abundant flowering (brocollini)
• color variations

I always forget to take pictures when things are at their most beautiful. For example, I have no pictures of the first generation, the oldest plants, in full flower. But it’s one of my favorite times of the year.

Here are some young plants. They usually get the color variations after frosts.

Purple leaf veins

Some Savoy cabbage heritage

It doesn’t look right to some, but I’m going for this kind of growth habit. Lots of sideshoots along the main stem. If I want to take cuttings and clone the plant, it is very easy to do.

As you can see, the stem bends down and then roots at the soil, effectively creating a kale brush.

White leaves. This albino flowered and is setting seed. Considering how little clorophyl is has, I’m quite satisfied with the amount of biomass

Some pictures of flowering earlier this spring. I wasn’t focused so much on documenting the kale flowers here. Just some snapshots from a little garden project I have on a tremendously polluted site in the middle of Pusher street where I live. Not to eat the crops, but as a demo garden, a small oasis of calm and beauty in a place with too much violence.

[malterod]

How I grow out the plants: I’ve started the plants in trays and grown the on for a couple of months before planting out. I found this was necessary at my nursery site, because the slug population is so high. The plants need to have a certain vigor to not be eaten in a matter of days.

This year I tried broad sowing the seed with good luck - not at the nursery site, but a place where there are still slugs. I’m curious to try this method more places. Kales have been relatively easy to increase seed with.

[Bizarro (Joseph)]

This is great. That variegated kale is all sorts of ‘Wow’.

I have some questions for you:

When you say ‘cold hardy’ what exactly does that mean to you and your site?

I have a USDA proclaimed 5A zone site but this means almost nothing to me as zones mean very very little when you experience my annual extremes. Last season I had at least light frosts every month of the year. This year I had 5 consecutive days below -25 F (-40 F for 3 consecutive days) and I had three consecutive sub 29 F hard frost mornings June 14-17th. Banana pants.

I lost almost all of my original Going to seed kale plants in this process BUT I am currently isolating the three kale plants that returned and set seed after these cold snaps (a true lacinato type and two Russo-Siberian/Russian Red crosses) AND I wildly have several tree collards that returned including a lacinato type (all started from seed in 2023).

[YrtheArts (Brent Hopkins)]

I’m growing the Homesteader’s Kaleidoscopic Perennial Kale mix from EFN this year, first time trying it. I direct seeded it along with the EFN Ultracross Collards mix. There are also numerous tomato volunteers, onions, Solanum americanum, sunflowers and goosefoot (I have adopted the name ‘goosefoot’ preferential over ‘lambs quarters” to avoid prejudicing the discussion locally) mixed in, so it’s difficult to photograph any of them well.

Both the perennial kale and the collards are doing very well. They took long enough to germinate, that i thought they were all a loss, but when they finally did germinate they were pretty successful. The plants are getting big, the whole patch is a bit of a jungle now.

Some of the collards are already going to seed. I’m letting them, just in case winter takes a heavy toll. Will be interesting to see how well they all overwinter. Right now I’m harvesting a lot of greens from the patch. So, as is, I’m already satisfied, but time will tell about future hardiness. Zone 6a

[malterod]

I’ve added climate zone details. The nursery site is roughly zone 7 and fairly wet in winter with a large slug population, that’s the main limitations and why I try to breed for more hardiness and robustness. The city site is zone 9, more well-draining and less slugs. Much easier to overwinter reliably.

I should have said I’m mainly working with Brassica oleracea for perennial kale. I believe Sibirian / Russian kales are Brassica napus - my notes say this species originally came about as a a cross of oleracea and rapa, but I don’t suppose they backcross easily do they?

[GreenBeard (Robert Beard)]

I have 4 kale from the perennial kale grex that has survived now 2 years. One winter there was a 40 degree cold snap from 30 to -10 and these survived that. I’m in Albany NY zone 5b. Saving seed from all of these. They all show thick bark and bush like traits. If anyone with other extreme cold snap survivors wants to swap seed let me know.

[WojciechG (Wojciech Górny)]

I have tried to grow some perennial kale varieties but none survived longer than two seasons. Winter temperatures here rarely go below - 30 C ( - 22F), but we are lacking snow cover these days, which makes it more difficult for the plants. I am still looking for seeds ogf anything that has a chance to survive longer that two seasons.

[markwkidd]

I’m interested in this topic so I want to be sure I understand what is meant by perennial kale.

Do the perennial varieties live for an indefinite amount of years, or is it limited to three? Three seems to be the limit of brassica species I have grown.

Do these kale varieties produce flowers and seeds, and then continue their vegetative growth? I have seen that once with a variety of cabbage which also happened to be very cold hardy.

[malterod]

Perennial means they live for three years or more. Some of my perennial kales have lived for 6-7 years and might live longer. The key is that they clone themselves via lots of sideshoots, that gives them a bushy growth pattern, the long sideshoots then bend down and root. The kale rejuvenates itself. Individual stems usually don’t live longer than three years. So the clonal behavior is key in my experience.

The perennial kales I’ve grown and want to select for do produce flowers and seeds to then continue to grow on. I believe Chris Homanics originally selected for this trait so the ability is in many ways due to his work.

[markwkidd]

Great, thank you for helping me be sure.

[Hugo (Hugo Morvan)]

I confirm that, my Daubenton must be 4 years old now. I’ve planted out some 40 seedlings of a diverse seed mix of perennial kales. Only two or three survived the snails. I’ve reseeded in the greenhouse where snail pressure is much lower and now the flea beetles are thinning them out.

[YrtheArts (Brent Hopkins)]

For the sake of convenience I’m grouping all my saved brassica seeds into the same mix. Segregating them became too much effort for me… and I’m not even sure it’s possible at some point. At least in my garden. Thus, if anything can cross, it probably will, eventually.