How to grow perpetual spinach, and why it's really a silverbeet

Perpetual spinach is the leafy green I'd point anybody towards if they've tried growing proper English spinach here and watched it run to seed the moment the weather warmed up, because it gives you spinach style leaves for months on end and it doesn't throw in the towel at the first hot day.

It isn't actually spinach

The name is a bit of a fib. Perpetual spinach is a leaf beet, which makes it the same species as silverbeet and beetroot, and it has nothing much to do with true English spinach at all. You get the smaller, softer leaves and the mild flavour of spinach, with thin green stems instead of the thick white ribs you'd see on a silverbeet, and you get the toughness of the beet family underneath it. That's the whole trick, to be honest, and it's why it keeps cropping in conditions that would send English spinach straight to seed.

When to sow it here

Spring and autumn are the easy windows in our part of South Australia, because the seedlings get away quickly when it's mild and they're well settled before either the heat or the cold arrives. It'll usually come up through a gentle stretch either side of those as well, so if you've missed the window it's often still worth a go. A sowing in autumn will carry you through winter, and a sowing in spring will carry you through to the following year if you look after it.

Sowing it so it actually comes up

Beet seed is a bit unusual, because what looks like one seed is actually a corky little cluster with several seeds inside it, so you'll often get 2 or 3 seedlings coming up from the one spot. Soaking the seed in water overnight before you sow it softens that corky coat and helps it along. Sow it about 1 to 2cm deep in soil that's had some compost dug through, and keep it damp until it's up. Once the seedlings have a few leaves on them, snip the extras off at ground level so the strongest one gets the spot to itself. Give each plant about 30cm, because they get bigger than people expect, and crowded plants are the ones that bolt.

Keeping it happy

It's a leafy crop, so it wants regular water and a steady supply of nitrogen, and a liquid feed every few weeks while you're picking from it keeps the new leaves coming. A layer of mulch around the plants keeps the roots cool and the soil evenly damp through summer, which matters, because a plant that's been allowed to dry out hard is the one most likely to send up a flower stalk. Snails love it as much as we do, so keep an eye out after rain.

How to pick it so it keeps going

You can usually start picking about 8 weeks after sowing, once the plant has a decent clump of leaves. Take the outer leaves first by snapping or cutting them off at the base, and always leave the young leaves in the middle alone, because that centre is where the new growth comes from. Picked like that, a handful of plants will keep a household in greens for months.

The bit the name doesn't tell you

Perpetual isn't quite forever. Leaf beet is a biennial, so most plants will eventually send up a flower stalk in their second spring, and once that happens the leaves get smaller and tougher and it's time to pull the plant out and compost it. Heat or a dry spell can bring that on earlier. That's why a lot of people sow a few more seeds every so often, so there's always a younger plant coming along behind the older ones.

Shop related products

• D.T. Brown Perpetual Spinach seed. The seed this post is about, in a 100 seed packet.
• D.T. Brown Spinach English Medaniat seed. True English spinach, for a cool season sowing when you want the real thing.
• Martins Organic Sugar Cane Bale 11KG. A light mulch that keeps the roots cool and the soil evenly damp.
• Neutrog 1L Seamungus Liquid Concentrate. A liquid feed to water on while you're picking regularly.

Did you know we also stock D.T. Brown Fordhook Giant silverbeet seed in the shop, which is the big ribbed cousin of perpetual spinach, and it isn't on the website, so give us a ring on (08) 8536 4333 to check what's on the shelf.

The rest of the seed and mulch range is in our garden centre, and if you're not sure what will suit your patch, come in and chat with us.

More from the veggie patch

• How to stop spinach bolting in a home veggie patch
• How to grow kale and keep it cropping
• How to start your first vegetable garden

I'm a big fan of any vegetable that forgives me for forgetting about it for a week, and this one is about as forgiving as they come.

Candeece