[QUOTE=Worth1;748618]Daylight savings time is ending the coming Sunday.
I wonder if it is going to mess my onions up.:?!?:[/QUOTE]
:lol:

10/29/2019
 

Garlic coming up. :D
[ATTACH]90542[/ATTACH]

10/31/2019
 

The store bought mystery green onions I planted are putting on their second new leaves.
Tonight will be the cold test for all of the baby onion plants and cabbage as it is getting down to 31 degrees.
Happy Halloween.:D

Yesterday I bought the seeds of root parsley, spinach, onion and shallot. In the garden I have two flowerbeds ready to sow these seeds before the soil freezes. It's just an attempt I don't know what to expect from. Mainly I am interested in germinating parsley with which is a problem during spring sowing. I have never grown shallots from seeds, so I wonder what it will be like. It's a hybrid.
Vladimír

I'm a bit late with this but NESeed.com (New England Seed and they have a catalog) is a good source for short day onions. They must sell all over the country to small farm operations-almost typed small farmers but that might get moved to the joke thread. They also have lots of tomato varieties and Italian varieties.

11/1/2019
 

Thanks for the link.
Here are the store bought green onions as of today after the freeze we got last night.
The wee babies are doing fine as well as the garlic and cabbage.
[ATTACH]90555[/ATTACH]

11/2/2019
 

Yesterday when I got home I did some probing and the elephant garlic has taken root and the tops are starting to bud out.:D

I've often read elephant garlic is not a true garlic. It tastes like garlic to me, and most stores sell it as garlic. If it is not garlic, what is it?

In the onion family, a type of leek, I think. I grow it often and like using it quite a bit.

[QUOTE=DonDuck;748941]I've often read elephant garlic is not a true garlic. It tastes like garlic to me, and most stores sell it as garlic. If it is not garlic, what is it?[/QUOTE]

In my opinion it is its own thing which it is but named garlic.
It looks like and grows like for the most part like garlic.
It has the chemical compounds of both garlic and onion.
One of which onions dont have but garlic has and the other of which garlic has but not onions.
They are all in the same family and genus and even very close kin in order to the agave.
The species is where things start to change when it comes to onions, garlic, elephant garlic, leeks, chives and so on.
Allium is the Latin word for garlic. allium sativum is the Latin word for cultivated garlic.

A very long rabbit hole to say the least.
I have spent hours in it exploring on and off.

Much like the one that our peppers are in and how they are named throughout the world.
Such as paprika pimento chilies and so on and how the word use is swapped around.

Hi Werth and any other seasoned onion growers.

A few of my onions have started to bolt/send up flower stems (Australian spring season) which I have picked off.

Will these bulb up any further or should I pick and eat those ones now?

Appreciate your opinions, this is my first year growing regular onions.

[QUOTE=CassInVic;748991]Hi Werth and any other seasoned onion growers.

A few of my onions have started to bolt/send up flower stems (Australian spring season) which I have picked off.

Will these bulb up any further or should I pick and eat those ones now?

Appreciate your opinions, this is my first year growing regular onions.[/QUOTE]

You need to pick and eat them now they think it has been two years due to weather fluctuations.
Our you let them go to seed and collect the seed if they aren't hybrid.

[QUOTE=Worth1;748992]You need to pick and eat them now they think it has been two years due to weather fluctuations.
Our you let them go to seed and collect the seed if they aren't hybrid.[/QUOTE]

If you catch them making a seed stalk early enough and break it off at the base they will sometimes go on to make a good bulb. If it is done too late you might as well pull it and eat it. I start looking for and breaking off those baby seed stalks as soon as the onions start swelling to make onion bulbs.

I ordered my onion seed this year from Everwilde Farms and from Sustainable Seed company as both have a good selection of short day onions. I gave up trying to grow medium day and long day onions decades ago. It was just too frustrating and the results were usually poor but some years they would do okay. My favorites now are 1015, Red Burgundy, Red Creole, White Bermuda, and Red Granex. I grow Texas Grano but I haven't had as good a result with them as with the 1015. I just love those red ones when they get big and I can put a big slice on a burger.:)

I start all my onions in mid October thru mid November in the greenhouse in pots of DE as it is so much easier to get the onions out when it is time to plant them out in the garden as long as I let the DE get fairly dry before removing them all at once and shaking the DE off the roots and separating them. I have a good stand right now with all my onions except from some two year old Bermuda seed which looks to have germinated at less than 50%. I have some newer ones so I will probably start some more in a week or so. I like to set Bermudas out a bit later anyway since they make the best keepers when they are only about 3 to 4 inches. If they have too long to grow they tend to get too large and the outer layers split causing many to rot in storage.

Bill

11/4/2019
 

Picked up two more heads of elephant garlic at the store yesterday.
Will plant them today maybe.

We never see elephant garlic here. Maybe it shows up rarely, I've heard it discussed but never seen one myself. They charge a fortune for it, is pretty much the tale. Don't forget to post pics, Worth. :D
@Vladimir, it would be cool if I could sow shallots in the fall here, but I wonder if they would survive to sprout. :?!?: Then again, I saved every seed I could find from my crazy bed of flowering shallots this year, partly because I didn't want to let the seeds fall and face a "feral shallot" situation. :panic::twisted: So in my mind, they could survive.... I'm just not sure. :)

It was $1.58 a head for the elephant garlic.

That's not bad for a big vegetable.

11/4/2019
 

Got the other two heads of elephant garlic planted.
That lovely soil wasn't there when I moved here, it was a barren waste land you couldn't drive a nail through.
I built it.:)
[ATTACH]90599[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH]90600[/ATTACH]

11/5/2019
 

First of the elephant garlic peeking out of the soil. :D
[ATTACH]90606[/ATTACH]

Thank you both, I have pulled anything with a hint of a seed stalk and they will soon become an onion and goats cheese tart

Our weather this spring has been unusual so that may be partly to blame.

I planted a ‘mixed variety’ packet this year but next season will start experimenting with different day length types and planting times to see what works best here.

11/6/2019
 

You are more than welcome.:)
The other day when I was planting the elepant garlic my meighbors 60 some odd year old son asked me.
What are you planting?
I said, 'I'm planting garlic onions and cabbage.
He looked at me like I was fishing in the middle of the highway or something.
He said isn't it a little to late to be planting a garden?
No, 'I exclaimed it is the time of year to plant this stuff the winter here not the summer.
I think he thinks I'm nuts.:lol:

More elephant garlic is coming up as well as regular garlic.:D
Some cabbage putting on first true leaves.

I love growing onions. The weeds love it when I grow onions, too. Do you mulch your onions to keep weeds out?

Elephant garlic is supposed to grow true seeds (like leeks do), I believe, unlike most regular garlic. However, I've never seen anyone selling the true seeds. Everyone who grows them here, do you see true seeds growing on them, or do they grow bulbils instead? It's illegal to ship out-of-state Allium bulbs into Idaho unless they're certified in some way I don't know about; so, I look for true seeds and local Alliums.

[QUOTE=shule1;749187]I love growing onions. The weeds love it when I grow onions, too. Do you mulch your onions to keep weeds out?

Elephant garlic is supposed to grow true seeds (like leeks do), I believe, unlike most regular garlic. However, I've never seen anyone selling the true seeds. Everyone who grows them here, do you see true seeds growing on them, or do they grow bulbils instead? It's illegal to ship out-of-state Allium bulbs into Idaho unless they're certified in some way I don't know about; so, I look for true seeds and local Alliums.[/QUOTE]

The first time I tried to grow it I was an idiot.
Had no idea what I was doing or what I needed to do.
Planted it in the spring and it croaked in the summer heat.
Never seen a seed even sold for elephant garlic other than the bulbils or what ever the heck they are called.
So this fall is my 2nd attempt after many years.
The garlic I bought from the grocery store is from Gilroy California
Christopher Ranch is where it came from.

11/10/2019
 

The only garlic that hasn't came up yet is the garlic I planted last week.
The store bought green onions are growing like weeds.
Seems like a new leaf every day.
Cut off a leaf and it as very tasty and sweet, not hot.
Old onion seeds never made it and will be tossed today.
I honestly didn't pay that much attention to them.

[QUOTE=shule1;749187]I love growing onions. The weeds love it when I grow onions, too. Do you mulch your onions to keep weeds out?

Elephant garlic is supposed to grow true seeds (like leeks do), I believe, unlike most regular garlic. However, I've never seen anyone selling the true seeds. Everyone who grows them here, do you see true seeds growing on them, or do they grow bulbils instead? It's illegal to ship out-of-state Allium bulbs into Idaho unless they're certified in some way I don't know about; so, I look for true seeds and local Alliums.[/QUOTE]


I have had elephant garlic growing wildly in my garden for years. The flower heads do develop seeds and I am drying some heads to see if I can get more than a few out of them. When I just let them mature and stand in the garden the seeds sprout while still in the flower head and drop sprouted, I think in spring. Watching more closely this year to see exactly when that happens.

11/14/2019
 

Looks like the wee plants made it through the freeze.

11/16/2019
 

Got this little area in the corner of my driveway I have been working on every other day.
Hoed it up with my grape hoe and raked it.
Ever so often I come back and hoe it again and kill off all the little winter weed and grass sprouts coming up.
Those little grass sprouts look just like baby onions and I cant have that.
Just about got them beat.
Normally do this when I get home and before I go in the house.
I have a big supply of cold (not hot) composted leaves I am mixing in as I go.
The side elephant garlic I planted in the ground will be popping out soon.
The what I think is hard neck garlic is getting its share of the cold treatment with the abnormally cold weather.
It is really starting to take off too.

Well Worth, it looks like you picked the right year to do it. :) At least you personally have a reason to be pleased about the cold. :lol:

11/25/2019
 

Transplants from the cabbage hatchery and Mexican red hard neck garlic.
Been working on this spot with a grape hoe for awhile now and considered it ready.
Plants placed garlic placed sprinkled 13-13-13 and watered in.
[ATTACH]90752[/ATTACH]

11/26/2019
 

All of the elephant garlic I planted has sprouted.
I know the cabbage is a little close together but we shall see what becomes of it.
That area was as hard ans a rock when I first moved here.
Not even any weeds would grow.
Built the soil up naturally.