Alliums
Mid-July, time for the annual shallot and garlic harvest. I did my usual gray shallots, German Brown hardneck garlic and new this year a softneck variety. The specific type of softneck isn't known; I got the bulb last year at the Ballard Farmers Market. It was a little late in the year (Oct) so there wasn't a lot of choices and I finally settled on a stall that had nice sized heads. I told him I was actually going to plant them vs eating and he just tossed a head over gratis! He called it "silverskin" variety which is a pretty generic name for softnecks. But for free food I am not complaining!
The German Browns didn't like the cold winter/late spring at all. These are the smallest heads I've ever got from them in at least 6 years of planting the same line. Fortunately for garlic there's a general rule of smaller bulbs higher flavor so the stress must make them concentrate their life force; a bit like grapes I guess. My main worry is that next year I won't have good bulbs to plant; I'll need to dedicate 2 maybe 3 of my heads as seed bulbs and even then it'll be a multi year process of getting my harvest up to 12 or 15 bulbs.
The pride and joy this year are the gray shallots. Normally their bulbs per plant run 1,2 large, 3-5 medium and 10+ little ones but I think like the garlics due to the cold they went concentrated: 3+ large bulbs, 5 medium and just a few small. I've lost count of how many seasons this is with the line of shallots; we got the parent bulbs from Gordon & Amy I guess the year they moved out of Grandma's so that was...6? 7? years now?
So while the tomatoes are still in suspended animation my alliums have come through as always!
The German Browns didn't like the cold winter/late spring at all. These are the smallest heads I've ever got from them in at least 6 years of planting the same line. Fortunately for garlic there's a general rule of smaller bulbs higher flavor so the stress must make them concentrate their life force; a bit like grapes I guess. My main worry is that next year I won't have good bulbs to plant; I'll need to dedicate 2 maybe 3 of my heads as seed bulbs and even then it'll be a multi year process of getting my harvest up to 12 or 15 bulbs.
The pride and joy this year are the gray shallots. Normally their bulbs per plant run 1,2 large, 3-5 medium and 10+ little ones but I think like the garlics due to the cold they went concentrated: 3+ large bulbs, 5 medium and just a few small. I've lost count of how many seasons this is with the line of shallots; we got the parent bulbs from Gordon & Amy I guess the year they moved out of Grandma's so that was...6? 7? years now?
So while the tomatoes are still in suspended animation my alliums have come through as always!
