ABSTRACT
The range of leek potions available is a testimony to human ingenuity and defies full documentation. Leek-growers conceal their knowledge from the world. To do otherwise would violate the secret contract which the grower has with his leek. To reveal one's techniques is to admit defeat in the annual battle of horticultural wits, to write off, perhaps, years of carefully sifted experience. Leek-growing takes time. It involves long hours loosening the soil in the trench; feeding; watering; and, so it is been recommended, talking to the leeks. Given the increase in 'nobbling' which takes place now, as much as four months before the show, a great deal of time must also be spent virtually on guard, and certainly men do sit up with their leeks overnight before the show and patrol the allotments. The complex technology of the leek is paralleled by an equally complex system of social relationships among the big gro.
