My curly kale is flowering...is this the end?

[Sillyness]

hey, i've seen that i can do some imaginative stuff with the flowers, but will the plant continue to have leaves?

Please help me in lay-mans terms as this is my first season of gardening and so technical terms allude me!

many thanks!!

anyone?

I would have said it is the end because when greens and lettuce start flowering they start to get tough and taste strongly. So I googled 'kale flowers' and you can eat them. See here kale flowers. I would be interested to know what they taste like if you try the recipe.

Will do, many thanks Mumsie!

You can eat the flower shoots before they open just the same way that you eat broccoli (they're actually the same species, just selected for different things).

The leaves will still be fine to eat too, but as it flowers it will put more and more energy into that, and less into leaves, and in a while (probably 2-3 weeks now) it won't have any leaves worth picking, then its time to take the plants out.

Keep picking off the flower shoots as they come (and cut off any that have already opened) and it will last a bit longer.

Kale leaves don't get bitter as the plant runs to seed, though as Mumsie said lettuce is no good to eat once it gets to that stage.

I think it is flowering/going to seed, because due to the prolonged dry weather, it is under stress. I would give it a good watering, and cut some of the flowering plants down and leave the remaining. That way you should get new growth whilst leaving the flowering part to go to seed and self seed so that you will get new plants. Hope that makes sense.

I'm assuming its kale from last year, though, Driftwood? If so it will always start to flower & finish its life cycle at this time of the year - unfortunately with kale even if you cut it right back it will still flower once it has started that stage, IYSWIM.

There are a few perennial broccolis/tree cabbage varieties that will carry on for several years if you cut them back & don't let them flower in spring, but sadly I've not run into a curly kale that will perenniate.