Once it bolts, it's over. There are a lot of folks who simply refuse to grow spinach anymore and grow comparable greens instead because of spinach's finicky nature.

Try a fall planting of spinach...

justaguy is right. Once it's bolting that's the end. But I wouldn't give up on spinach. Just follow violets advice or, next spring, plant in an area that gets afternoon sun. I did, and my spinach has not bolted even though the temps have been high.

When mine bolted last year I let it go ahead and self-seed. Its a fun game this year harvesting from the spinach "weeds" that are scattered around the garden. The self-sown ones are larger plants that the row I planted too!!

I did that with lettuce plants and now I have lots of pretty little lettuce seedlings all over the place. Maybe I'd better go ahead and harvest the spinach before this week's high temps do it in!

My spinach plants are actually pretty big  I started it indoors on March 1 and had nice little seedlings to set out in mid-April. They're very easy to grow. Maybe try it that way and think of it as a spring crop ....

I've already taken my 3rd or 4th harvest from my little spinach patch. I direct sowed back during the warm spell at the beginning of april i think? Honestly, I'm hoping mines almost done, I've done run out of room and need the space! I also had some in a container, it popped up great, but then stopped growing and turned yellow. I just pulled it out yesterday and composted it. I think I used some bad potting soil.

Try planting Swiss Chard it is not susceptible to bolting and it produces up until frost if you keep picking and reseeding.

Chard is very nutricious too and tastes delicious, we plant tons of it.

Well, I've gotten quite a bit of spinach out of it already. I always cut the outer leaves and let the plant keep growing so I really shouldn't complain. Oh well, I was hoping I could save them. I've just never had them bolt so early before. Thanks anyway guys. It was worth a shot.

I harvested all of it today and turned in the roots. I noticed there were hundreds of rollie-pollies in there, but the soil wasn't really that damp, even 6-8 inches down. Could be that the large spinach leaves acted as a good living mulch, kept it cool and just damp enough for them to thrive.

I don't intend to give up on spinach. I'll probably do a fall planting. I've grown chard and I like it, but there's nothing quite as good as spinach.

I planted my spinach in the fall, I know we must have milder winters than you do but it eeked along all winter and then in the spring started growing like crazy. Mine haven't bolted yet, I planted the "space" variety from Johnny's so there are definitely also types that are probably slower to bolt than others.

I planted some spinach seedlings about a month ago and put them under lights. They grew long and leggy and now they're trying to flower. That room has been on the cool side until several days ago when the weather warmed up. I think my Bibb lettuce bolted, too. It's not a head, it's a leggy stem.

When's the best time to plant for a fall crop?

I have a volunteer lettuce in my garden from the lettuce I gave up on last year. And I think I have a volunteer potato.

Here in zone 5b, I began sowing my spring spinach in fall several years ago. They overwinter with only a light cover of hay or row cover and come on like gangbusters in late winter. Usually it's a great technique. BUT this year the two weeks of summer weather that preceded the great freeze started them bolting just before the freeze. What a disappointment!