Vegetable · Brassicaceae
When to plant kai-lan
Grown for the thick flowering stem rather than a head, and cut just as the first buds show. Faster than broccoli and far less fussy about heat.
Sow direct
2 weeks after
Counted from your last spring frost.
Days to maturity
50-70
From sowing to a first picking.
Frost tolerance
Half hardy
How much cold the plant itself will take.
Those weeks become real dates once you name a place.
Timing, in frost-relative terms
Seed packets rarely give calendar dates, because a date that suits one latitude is wrong at another. They give offsets from the last spring frost instead, and those offsets are what make kai-lan plantable anywhere.
- Sow direct 2 weeks after the last frost.
- Expect 50–70 days to maturity, counted from sowing.
- Sow again every 21 days for a continuous supply.
Getting the timing right
Sow from two weeks after the last frost and again every three weeks. Cutting the main stem above a leaf brings a second flush of side shoots.
Frost tolerance
Takes a light frost around -4C. Cold makes the stems sweeter but slows them to a stop, so late sowings need a cloche to finish.
Classified as half-hardy, with damage expected below -4°C (24.8°F)24.8°F (-4°C).