Like a giant chive with its large, round, hollow leaves whose base is wide enough to be stuffed into appetizer bites, the bunching onion (Allium fistulosum) carries delicious flowers at arm’s length, and not just for pollinators! They stand pointing towards the sky like the standards of defense for a whole range of beneficial insects; full of nectar, also rallying pollinators.

It is a repellent plant even against certain fungal diseases, which we like to associate with alpine and common strawberries. Its bristly texture, with its linear and vertical leaves, is welcome in our flowerbeds for the diversity of shapes appearing the day after the snow melts, then normally turning yellow in the mid-season heat, ending in a revival when the cool returns, greening up to be completely covered in snow.

Bunching onion should be planted alternately with summer stars for an ornamental appearance all year round. A perennial vegetable recognized as a health food.