Chives
Allium schoenoprasum · Onion family
Plant portrait
Chives form a clump of slender hollow cylindrical leaves.
Harvested part
The leaves; the flowers are edible too.
What to watch for
Distinguish hollow leaves from stems carrying purple flower clusters.
Growth stages of the chives
Plotilo illustrates the chives in 5 stages in 3D: seed, small sprout, young plant, growing and harvest. The models show typical shapes; they do not predict how long growth takes.
- Seed
Starting from a seed. It is shown on the surface to make it visible in this illustration.
- Small sprout
A short first stem and its first small leaves emerge.
- Young plant
The young plant carries more leaves and starts to take its own shape.
- Growing
Leaves and stems develop. Their shape depends on the species.
- Harvest
An illustration of the harvested part. Roots are made visible for clarity; this image does not confirm actual maturity.
Same botanical family
Same botanical family as the chives (the onion family): the leek, the onion, the garlic, the elephant garlic, the wild garlic, the shallot and 2 more plants from the catalogue. Gardeners usually avoid growing the same family in the same spot several years in a row: that is the idea behind crop rotation.