Showing posts with label multiplier onion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label multiplier onion. Show all posts

Saturday, February 22, 2014

Kitchen Garden / Winter Gardening / Raised Bed. Progress Report. 2.22.14

Covered Tunnel Version 3.  Step 1.

Covered Tunnel Version 3.  Step 2.
Topset Onions Germinated
Radishes and Turnips Germinated
I removed the row cover from the winter vegetable bed.  This bed was planted 1.28.14 so is just under one month after planting.

I originally used polyethylene cover.  That collected rain and collapsed.  I replaced that with permeable row cover.  That collected snow and collapsed.

Meanwhile, there were freezes into the 20s, and a blizzard.

When I removed the row cover, I saw the radish seeds and turnip seeds had germinated.  A few spinach seeds germinated.  Chinese mesclun germinated nicely.  I did not see any cabbage plants.  The topsets from Egyptian Walking Onions were about an inch tall.  Those were unusually small sets I had in the garage.

I didn't weed this time although it could use weeding.  One of the main challenges is vermin, including slugs, voles, rabbits, mice, and others.  So far these seedlings were not eaten.  Although maybe the cabbage seeds germinated and were eaten.

I watered with diluted fish emulsion as a vermin repellent.  Then I applied a dusting of hot pepper / dried blood for the same reason.  Then I added organic slug bait.

The mouse traps were not set off, but mouse traps in the garage had 3 of 4 traps with mice.  So I moved those to the garage.

I went back to a polyethylene row cover.  This time I used wire fencing as a support.  That will prevent pooling of water / collapse.  I should get a larger sheet so I can weigh down the sides with bricks.  Wind might otherwise catch it.  I changed to the polyethylene again because I think it will hold in more heat, and maybe it is more light permeable as well.  It will stay more dry, which is probably good although it might wind up needing some watering.

Tuesday, January 28, 2014

January Gardening. Winter Seed Planting. 1.28.14

Winter Garden Bed

Planted, watered, covered, clipped.
I'm off this week for vacation.  A chance to give in to fatigue and just let it go, sleep like the dead, rest.

I uncovered the one bed that I had ready for winter gardening.  At the far end are small (less than 1 inch tall) onion plants.  Those are from Waking Onion topsets I planted ?1 month ago?.  Some were pulled out of the ground.  I don't know by what.  A couple have been chewed off.

I prepped the soil with a garden rake.  A few minutes effort.  The soil is not fluffy, but not hard either.  Not soggy, really pretty nice.

I planted seed for turnips, radishes, chinese cabbage, mesclun, spinach.  And more perennial onion sets, small.  I found those in the garage.

Spread around a dried blood - hot pepper concoction from Fred Meyer.  That was on sale.  Should deter some pests - rabbits, deer.  It was a small creature that ate the onions, I maybe a vole or slug.  If I remember, tomorrow I'll get mouse traps and spread slug bait.

Lightly covered the seeds and sets.  Watered them in.   The idea of the row cover is to let water in, but restrict air movement.  I don't know if it works.  Might change to polyethylene sheet, and accept that I have to water it myself.

The seeds were old.  1 to 4 years.  Mesclun was 4 years old.  If they don't grow, not a  big loss.  Should either plant or discard them, so I planted them.

The clips are clothes pins from Fred Meyer too.  They were about $1.99 for 25.  Compared to maybe $6 for a few purpose-made row cover clips.  I think they work better.  Wood clothes pins don't work.  They rot and fall apart.

Sunday, October 27, 2013

Onions, garlic, shallots.

Green onions from Egyptian Walking Onions
 Nice to have some scallions from the garden this time of year.  These were Egyptian Walking onions, that I did not pull out.  They resprouted and are beginning to be big enough to eat.

The onion bed is starting to grow.  Planted roughly 5 weeks ago.  At the end is a row of cilantro, about an inch tall, planted the same time.  The Egyptian Walking onions are all up.
Onion bed at one month
 The Yellow Potato onions are starting to grow.  Most are still not showing above ground.

The garlic, planted about 4 weeks ago, is several inches tall.  Right on schedule.

Yesterday I cleared out a 3-foot by 4 foot section of the tomato bed.  I added 1/2 bag of chicken compost, and planted shallots.  The shallot starts were saved from this summer.  I planted 4 rows.  That is from the original 2 rows.  About the same amount is available for eating.  Starting them later this year.   These shallots might have been larger, if I didn't let them go to seed.  The honeybees loved the flowers, so I didn't want to remove the flower heads.
Garlic bed at one month

Holland White Shallots

Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Multiplier Onions and Heritage Garlic Harvest.

German Porcelain Garlic

Inchelium Red Garlic
 Two weeks ago I dug up the German Porcelain garlic.  Nice bulbs, not as big as last year.  It's hot outside.  They are laid out on cardboard boxes in the garage, to dry.

Last weekend I dug up the Inchelium Red garlic.  They are also spread out on cardboard to dry.

Two weeks ago I dug up the Yellow Potato Multiplier Onions.  Biggest I've grown.  They are being treated in the same way.  No pic of that one yet.

They all look pretty good.  The earlier and later planted multiplier onions finished at the same time and are the same size.

There is some remaining garlic to harvest.

Meanwhile, where the garlic grew, I've planted cantaloupe, watermelon, and pole beans.    Quick rotation.

Sunday, June 30, 2013

Kitchen Garden

 Today was too hot to do anything.  Plus I felt sick.  But I did plant the beans I started 2 weeks ago.  These are Ning's Chinese pole beans.   Other than that I don't know what kind.

Starting them in containers work'ed nicely.  There were 10 containers, each with 2 or 3 plants.  I planted them were I dug up the onions.  Watered well.  Kept the straw mulch in place.

I didn't have the energy to build a rabbit/deer cage so they have a temporary chicken wire cage.  Might work.  Might not.

Also planted seedlings of the "Minnesota Midget" Cantaloupe.
 Nice roots on these beans.  Not too rootbound.
 The White Potato multiplier onions are the biggest I've grown.  All were the same size, both the first bed planted in September and the second planted in November.  I think - need to check back in this blog.
 The onions and German Porcelain garlic are drying in single layers in cardboard boxes in garage.  I didn't want to cook them in the sun.
There were also a couple of nice looking turnips.  First time I grew these.

Tuesday, March 19, 2013

Kitchen Garden. Scallions

Fantastic! The first vegetable from the raised beds at Battleground. These were Egyptian Walking Onions, planted Sept 27th.  Not only did they survive the winter, they flourished.

Tuesday, February 19, 2013

Raised Bed. Progress Report.

I pulled the soil thermometer out of the soil.  The air temp outside was 50F. The temp of the soil was 60F inside the row cover tunnel. This row of radishes has germinated. The snow peas seem to be germinating.  At the front are some cuttings I stuck into the soil.  Buddleia, a rose. And German Camomile plants. This is the first raised bed.  I started itlast fall. Garlic and Multiplier onions have perked up nicely. Chinese Chives starting to grow.  Looking nice for Feb.  On the right, the "Illinois" heritage Chinese Chives have put on 2 incesh of growth, thick and lush. The bigger growing, less delicate Changchun Chinese chives are on the left.  Very hard to see. They are starting to grow.  They will catch up and pass the Illinois Chives, growing much larger by mid Spring.  I also planted more seeds of the Changchun Chives. If they germinate I'll have a big stand of them.

Tuesday, February 05, 2013

Winter Gardening, continued

Planted some seeds in the first "Conastoga" bed. That includes spinach, icicicle radish, napa cabbage, bak choy, seeds from garlic chives.  Pic from Bok Choy, ink and color painting on paper by Wu Changshuo (1844-1927)
I found some unplanted sets for egyptian onions.  I don't need more, but not wanting them to go to waste, so planted them.
Also, in unprotected bed, Laburnum seeds collected last week from Laburnum tree. So those seeds were exposed for winter, and stratified in situ. Those are along one edge of iris bed. Along another edge, Chinese chive, my Illinois strain.

Sunday, November 25, 2012

Raised beds. Progress Report.

These are the onion and garlic raised beds. They look vulnerable to freezing. I am reminding myself that I think that every year and they make it through the winter fine. That's true for both the garlic and the multiplier onions. I think the onions and German Porcelain garlic are way ahead of previous years. I hope that doesn't mean the freeze will kill them. Every year is a new lesson to learn.
The front is German Porcelain garlic. Germination was 100%. One had mottled leaves which had me concerned about viral infection so I pulled it out. Not sure that makes a difference. This bed also has rescue garlic, unnamed from the yard. And one row of Inchelium Red. The rescue garlic and Inchelium red were much slower. That may not matter next year. We'll see. Germination for those was 100%. The Holland shallots germinated 100%. Today I pulled the innumerable small weeds. Then I mulched with leaf compost. The chinese chives leaves are dead. The sprouted chinese chives seedlings look delicate, about 2 inches tall.
All but one of the Inchelium Red garlic germinated. So that's 34/35. Maybe the last is just pokey. I pulled out weeds and mulched with leaf compost. After that I remembered the mycorhizal inoculant, which I spread around the multiplier onions and chinese chives, which I also weeded. Weeds were about 2 inches tall. I used a kitchen fork. That sounds difficult but it was easy in the raised beds. The small tool gave me control around the delicate plants. Then I scratched in the inoculant and added compost.

Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Progress Report. Mostly Allium family vegetables.

No pics today. Today I built raised bed #3. Filled about 3/4 with soil/leaf compost mix. The top soil was muddy - not the best way to build a garden bed, but not much choice. I did not tramp it down, kept my feet off, and mixed in about 25% compost, so it should be OK. When it is filled, this bed will contain ornamentals that need fall planting. I noted last weekend that the Chinese chive seeds I planted have germinated, and are 1 inch tall. Not sparse. The germination must be approaching 100%. Issue now is will the seedlings survive winter? I'm betting yes. But I have more seeds to plant in spring, in case they don't. Yellow Potato Onions in the first bed are 100% sprouted. Most are about 4 inches tall. Yellow Potato Onions in the 2nd bed are about 50% sprouted. Egyptian Walking Onions in both beds are 100% sprouted, and about 4 to 6 inches tall. Inchellium Red garlic in the first bed is about 1/3 sprouted. German Porcelain garlic in the 2nd bed is 100% sprouted and about 5 inches tall. Some of the Dutch Shallots in the 2nd bed have sprouted. Three plants so far. So far none of the Safeway Shallots have sprouted. Cilantro seeds are also sprouting in the onion "bucket" planters. Planted at the same time as the onions. Not bad for late October.

Sunday, October 14, 2012

Garlic and Onions: Progress report

The German Porcelain garlic has grown rapidly. These were planted 9/27. A few were visible last week. Most are 2 or 3 inches tall. Some of the multipliers (Egyptian Walking) are also about an inch above ground, but most are not.
These are the Yellow Potato Onions that I planted 9/9/12. I think roughly half are growing. Time flies. That's about one month. I'm not concerned about the ones that are not visible yet. Chances are it's too early to think about it. With fall rains starting, no need to water now. Once the plants are clearly visible, I'll weed better. I don't want to injure new sprouts. The Inchelium Red Garlic, planted 2 or 3 weeks earlier, is way behind the German Porcelain Garlic. I see one sprout, about an inch tall. I'll feel antsy until many more of them are visible.

Thursday, September 27, 2012

Raised Bed #2. More fall planting

Finished the second raised bed. Similar to the first. Moving soil and mixing in compost, is hard work. Like the first raised bed, much of the topsoil is finely ground mole hills. There are a lot of them. They are easily dug, and need to be shaved off for mowing purposes.
Filled, mixed, smoothed over, ready to plant. Like the first raised bed, I added about 1/4 to 1/3 compost, made at a local recycling center from yard waste. It's black and crumbly. This is the "experimental garden". It contains: 3 rows of German Porcelain Garlic. This is a new variety to me. The sign stated, German Porcelain Garlic has fewer, larger cloves - good, I don't like peeling the tiny middle cloves, and this variety doesn't have them; strong punguent flavor - good. So it's worth a try. 1 row of Safeway Red Shallots. Because that's where I bought them. 2 rows of "rescue Garlic" - NoID from my back yard, small cloves, some are bulbs that did not clove. I want to see if they produce well, once in good soil and treated well. They could be almost any variety - over the years, I've grown grocery store garlic, Inchelium Red, German Red, and NoID garlics. 1 row of Holland Red Shallots. I found them at a local nursery. I read grocery shallots might be treated with a growth inhibitor and not grow. So I'm trying both. 2 rows of Yellow Potato Onions - mainly the small bulbs, a few larger ones. I found them while sorting through garden tools. 1 row of Inchelium Red garlic. Wanted to add a few more. My favorite. 1 row of Ixia for fun and as a test. They may not make it through the winter here. 1 row with one Allium gigantium bulb, multiple Egyptian Walking Onion bulbs - these will split into several scallions, faster than the small sets grow, and divisions from an old clump of garlic chives, to see if they are regenerated in the new setting.
Laid out in rows, ready to plant.
Planted, labeled, covered with a light layer of compost, watered, and ready for fall. Note: Egyptian Walking Onion starts in the first raised bed are about 1 inch tall now. Growing fast. The rescued garlic chives are also generating firm, green, new growth, about 1 inch long. Garlic and Yellow Potato Onions are not yet visible. It's very early. It's been in the 70s anbd 80s, without rain. So I watered them today.

Saturday, September 15, 2012

Raised Bed. Fall planting onions, garlic, garlic chives

Half full. More trips around the area for mole hills. Several wheel barrows full. Piled in a layer of soil, then a layer of compost, then turned over, then watered, then repeated this routine for more layers until about 2 inches below the upper edge. Raked smooth.
The Starts I brought from home. It was a strange feeling - like getting starts from a friend or neighbor or relative, except they came from me.
Inchellium Red, from containers this year. I separated about 40 cloves, and wound up planting 35 of them. Should be enough, with a few heads to repeat next year if fate allows.
The separated cloves. These are very big.
Heads from Egyptian Walking Onions, sets ready to separate and plant. Most will be for scallions. I'll try to pull scallions to separate plants about 6 inches or a foot apart to repeat this cycle, too. Also for some fresh onions.
Garlic chives. I dug these from around the yard, where seedlings had taken root and grown. One batch is a rescue from my late parents' yard. I remember, I planted them as a boy, thinking they looked nice and not knowing they were edible. They persisted and reseeded, annoying my Dad but he was never able to get rid of them. I'm glad. Now I have this memory plant from my boyhood. It has smaller, more delicate leaves compared to the plants I've been growing. Those came from a seed packet from north China, most likely a commercial variety. They are about 4 generations of saved and replanted seeds, or self-sown. By mixing they 2 types together, maybe the next generation of seedlings will be in between. A little more hefty than my boyhood plants, a little more tender than the Chinese plants. I'm into genetic diversity, regardless.
All arranged. The garlic is about a foot apart, 7 X 5 = 35 cloves. The White Potato Onions are arranged similarly, except 7 X 6 = 42 plants. The Egyptian Walking Onions are in 3 narrowly spaced rows of about 15 per row, thinking most will be used for scallions. The garlic chives are in bunches, making a single wide row about 6 inches wide. They look kind of sad, but I think they will do OK, grow new roots, and generate nice plants for the Spring. I cut off the flower heads, but left the leaves, so they can photosynthesize during the fall and make roots and store energy for next Spring's crop.
All done. Doesn't look like much, but when the garlic and onions germinate, they'll make a nice neat garden bed. The blue tub was what I used last fall for the same purpose - multiple tubs. I planted it with more Egyptian Walking Onions, thinking they will grow faster in dark colored plastic container = warmer in the sun, and give scallions this fall. Experiment.

Saturday, July 07, 2012

Onions, Garlic in Containers. Allium harvest.

It's July in the Maritime Pacific Northwest, so onions, garlic, and other alliums are ripening off. The garlic and elephant garlic are not quit there, so I've left them in their containers. They won't get further water, however. Same for the container of Egyptian Walking Onions.

This was my first experiment growing White Potato Onions (heritage multiplier onion) in containers. I didn't get all of the weeds pulled in late Spring, but they did well anyway. Pleased at the size and number of onions. Two weeks ago, I moved the containers out of the rain and sun, to the north side of the house, to dry off without baking. That's a good part about the containers.  I was concerned about these last fall for 2 reasons.  First, I planted them late, so I didn't know if they would get off to a good start.  Second, I was concerned the plastic containers would either heat up too much, or freeze too much.  They did fine.
Here are the White Potato Onions,  pulled up. This is one container of onions. I don't think you could have so many in an equivalent 2 foot diameter disk in the soil. I will leave them here to dry out. It's in the 80s today so they should dry in a week.
One of the garlic containers. This one is hardneck garlic.  Hardneck garlic forms a scape - the flower head that creates tiny bulbils if allowed to mature.  In early June, we removed the scapes and stir fried them - yummy flavor.  Early removal of scapes is thought to increase the size and yield of the final garlic bulbs.    The plants are starting to dry out. I hope it doesn't rain. These wooden containers are too heavy to move to a sheltered spot.  Since this is the hardneck, it's the  German White Porcelain garlic that I bought and planted last fall.  I forgot to label them, but that's how I can tell the difference.  Glad I sorted that out.  Also it makes sense, because I planted the extra cloves of German White in with strawberries and peppers, and those also sent up scapes.
This one is the softneck garlic.  Softneck garlic does not have a scape.  Inchelium Red garlic, which is what I started with a few years ago, is softneck.  So now I have identified the varieties.
These Allium gigantium were in an inconvenient location. The flower stalks were completely brown, dry, and crispy, so OK to dig up. These started as one bulb about 2 years ago, so pretty good yield here, 5 bulbs. They'll get stored in the garage in paper bags, when dried off, and be replanted in the fall. They are the size of a medium onion.  I don't know if they are edible, and not all that interested in finding out.  However, they area an onion and garlic relative, and are ripening at the same time as the onions, so I included them here.

This Egyptian Walking Onion was mixed in with the White Potato Onions. I could tell because of the "head" of onions that it produced. It's not quite ready to harvest, but I did anyway. I want to see if it will dry off like the other onions, for storage.

Thursday, May 03, 2012

Kitchen Garden Progress Notes - Container Gardening

The yellow wax bush beans that I planted a 2 weeks ago. There appears to be some slug damage, so I added Worry Free organic slug bait.
Egyptian Walking Onions, multiplier onion, loves this method of growth. I planted these Oct. 29th. We did not eat many scallions this year, so these will go mainly toward eating onions and starts for a larger number for this fall. I don't know why we didn't eat more scallions, I love eating them.
German Garlic from Southern Exposure, also planted Oct 29th. They are also flourishing in the tubs. There should be some great garlic this summer.
Tomatoes I planted in a tub last week. The temp today is 49 - probably too cool, although last week it was in the 70s. The tubs warm up faster, so may be OK. This tub has seedlings from mesclun that should be ready to pull out in a couple of weeks. The sticks are mulberry prunings, an attempt to see if they grow by the "stick it in the ground" method that I use for figs, grapes, and forsythia. And roses.