shallot seeds

[purplevegman1]

in the book 'the allotment handbook' by caroline foley it says that if you sow shallot seeds you only get single bulbs. is this correct?

[Geordie]

generally yes, but the following year you sow the single bulb to get a clump.

[pigletwillie]

I will agree with Geordie to a point. One of my favourite shallots is an F1 variety called Prisma. It is an excellent size and shape, pink coloured flesh and stores really well.

I experimented by planting the bulbs (originaly grown from seed) expecting to get a clump. All I got were segmented larger bulbs that were a complete nightmare to prepare for cooking and as the extra segments were really scale shaped no use for pickling. Another problem was as there were several segments encased in the one bulb, some started to rot inside the neck

Non F1 varieties may well perform as expected and clump but, to be totally sure I would buy sets to ensure a crop and experiment with a few that were grown from seed. and see what happens.

[purplevegman1]

thanks very much sets it is then