Hi All,
Starting jan 1, we have been having a lot of snow. At one point I had three foot of it on my garden. It slowly melted away and exposed my garlic under it.
A lot on more had sprouted up. But! Everything was flat to the ground.
And now it has another eight inches on top of it. PLUS!!! the next three days we are up for another "winter storm warning" with snow again predicted.
YIKES!!!
Do you think my poor garlic will survive?
-T
I've got green onions that came though our -8° adventure just before Christmas then over 8" of snow with an ice storm following up the snow . They're putting up new growth since we've gotten a couple of weeks of warmer weather . Your garlic is going to be just fine .
What kind of onions are you over wintering?
And when did you plant them?
Seeds? Or that little bulbs?
These were planted last summer . They're just called "bunching onions" , I guess because you buy them by the bunch at the store ... I buy them as little bulbs , by the pound . I found out just the other day when I got these that if they're kept in the crisper drawer in the fridge they'll keep for quite some time .
And they are back under 1-1/2 foot of snow again!
That's not a bad thing . Snow is a pretty good insulator , I'd bet the temp 2" under the ground surface is pretty close to 32° . Depends a lot on how cold it was before the snow fell ...
T wrote: ...
yes. they'll be ok.
the bunching onions i have grown for a few years now are very mild and survive the winter without being mulched or babied at all.
tons of seeds from them last year too. they could take over the world if i'm not careful.
songbird
and all that snow is good news for the arid SW. looks like a great snow pack for both California and the Colorado River.
i hope it keeps piling up.
songbird
Sound right up my alley.
What kind of onions were they and where did your originally purchase them?
You know what, I remember a documentary on a high alpine berry that is pretty popular with hikers that can not be domesticated because the growers could not keep the bush covered for six months a year with snow.
Tokyo Bunching Onions, i got them from the local library seed library and returned many thousand seeds a few months ago. i still have a few hundred extra left (and should have a resupply by mid-summer).
i imagine they are commercially available but if you can't find them locally send me your snail mail address and i'll send you some since they are small enough to go by a regular sized envelope.
my e-mail address works.
songbird
Oh yo know what? On a whim, I planted the white ends of scallions (green onions) from the supermarket. They are still going at is four years now. I did not know they were also known as bunching onions.
Got me a bunch of seeds last year. I got my eye on a special spot in the garden.
Any issues with them cross pollinating with myu garlic? That would make for an interesting taste!
Dan Purgert wrote: ...
yes, young onions are often just used as a green onion. it isn't until months later that you would know that any sold to you are bunching onions or not since they are the ones that would not form bulbs.
as for cross-fertilization, they are different species so i don't think it happens apart from doing some genetic manipulations in the lab. note, however that some things called garlic are not garlic (elephant garlic is actually a wild leek).
for more fun there are onion hybrids. there are a lot more onion species than garlic.
songbird
Thank you!
Just out of curiosity, were does the term "bunching" come from? What do they mean by "bunch"?
T wrote: ...
i think it is the growth habit in that it divides into bunches of plants as compared to growing as a singular bulb.
but i could not say where the name came from for sure. it's probably very old. the onions have been cultivated for thousands of years.
songbird
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