What varieties of garlic and onions do you like to grow?

I just ordered their catalogue.  Thanks, Ginger, for mentioning them.

I haven't been successful at growing onions. However, maybe Audrey's walking onions may survive! This is from a head I stuck in a pot.

I live in central New Jersey and I have been growing Garlic - Polish White and Russian Red (one is softneck and one is a hardneck).
I order from Filigree Farm.

OOPS!
 It was Filaree Garlic Farm.

SR, correct. Gently separate the cloves and plant pointy end up, rough, blunt end down. The roots grow from that rough blunt in.

trolleydriver wrote:
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There is a farm near my house that grows garlic to raise funds to support persons with developmental disabilities. I think they grew about 40,000 and the work is done by volunteers.

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BTW: Coolest.Thing.Ever!

I have tried many different kinds of onions but never had any luck. This year I found a bundle of sets I guess they are called, wrapped with a rubber band at a local nursery back early in the spring. Baby green onions with little bitty roots, bare root not much soil attached. Easy to plant just stuck them in the MM with one finger, watered and the dang things took off and did very well, variety was Walla Walla Sweet. Been harvesting for a couple of months, biggest ones got about baseball size, not huge but pretty nice. Flavor was very mild and not hot. Guess that why they call them sweet onions. 

Hi Carguy Good to see you. Aren't you the member with the round composter? (rolling down the street) Any update on it?

sanderson wrote:Hi Carguy  Good to see you.  Aren't you the member with the round composter?  (rolling down the street) Any update on it?

Thanks Sanderson..
Yes you are correct about the round composter, it take's awhile to figure out how to use these things. Found out the hard way not to put any wet manures in it. I tried rabbit manure in it but all I got was about ping pong balls of poop..not good So I tried a different approach. I gathered a large amount of leaves last fall, I have a bagger on my riding mower, which works really well, large amount of leave in a short time. Before starting the bagging process I built a hoop out of some fencing in the SFG, I then piled them in the SFG over the winter for about 3 to 4 months.
By that time they had decomposed quite a bit. I cleaned them out of the bed in the spring before planting time and put them in the eight ball as I call it. I also have a two compartment tumbler which I also filled both sides of that. For green's I used a product called Chickity Doo Doo, grass clippings, kitchen scraps, and anything else leaf greens that I could find. I was left with some very nice stuff for the garden in a couple of months. I used it mostly as a mulch because it wasn't broken down all the way, although it worked wonderfully. Really helped hold the moisture and just breaks down into the MM without tying up nitrogen. In fact I believe it give the plants a drink of compost tea when ever it rains or I water the plants.

Carguy, Thanks for the update!

Scorpio Rising wrote:

Ginger Blue wrote:

trolleydriver wrote:
....

There is a farm near my house that grows garlic to raise funds to support persons with developmental disabilities. I think they grew about 40,000 and the work is done by volunteers.

....

BTW: Coolest.Thing.Ever!

Agree!

Here is some info about Silver Springs Farm as well as a link to their garlic recipes.

https://www.ocapdd.on.ca/english/Services/Enterprises/Silver_Spring_Farm/

https://www.ocapdd.on.ca/english/Silver%20Spring%20Farm%20Recipes/

Maybe I should not grow my own garlic but rather buy it from them since it is for a very good cause.

llama momma wrote:Last 3 years or so I've grown all German Red Garlic.  It is a hard neck variety. Quite Hot and spicy raw, very mild and nutty roasted. I also dehydrate and grind some for year round use, it keeps its spiciness.  Also known to have large easy to peel cloves. Bulbs are large, lots of 2-1/2 to  3 inch plus diameter size bulbs.  Darn near close to perfect in my humble opinion.

My mother called me randomly this summer and said she was at a garlic festival and asked if there were any garlic varieties I wanted. I remembered this post and asked for German Red, and later received a packet that was half that, and half Choparsky (marked with magic marker initials on the bulbs so one can tell which is which.)

Cloves of both varieties are peeled and soaking in water now for planting tomorrow (yes, I'm a little behind schedule.) I'll also give them a quick (5 minute) rubbing alcohol soak to try to prevent potentially introducing any garlic diseases into my MM.  

I only did a partial peel on my main garlic variety, Music, to check for those little brown spots near the tops that are probably harmless but really bother me. They seem clean (their parent cloves were alcohol soaked before planting last year), so they won't get the alcohol treatment this year.

Where did you get the idea of soaking in alcohol?  Do you have a link or source for that?

I think I saw it mentioned in more than one place - I did a lot of online research about garlic in 2015 after doing it wrong in 2014... and I've probably forgotten most of it. 
It may have been this page:
http://www.gourmetgarlicgardens.com/planting-and-growing-the-garlic.html

Beetles, I hope you will be pleased with your German Reds. 
I don't recall reading about pre treatmen's until you mentioned it.  Fascinating  article, thank 
you.

I planted Nepal and Sonoran garlic.  I read about pre-soaking in a couple of websites, so I presoaked and later dipped them in alcohol, too.  I hope I have better luck than my previous attempt.

Here's another article about soaking garlic prior to planting:

http://homeguides.sfgate.com/soak-garlic-seed-planting-66965.html

I wish I had known this a few weeks ago...

Although I do it, I do want to say I don't believe soaking is necessary. People plant garlic without soaking, and it works, too. My overnight soak was just warm water (no baking soda or seaweed.) I did it partly because I am planting pretty late and wanted to make sure the garlic was 'started.' (I germinate my bean and pea seeds before planting, too... I find rootlets very reassuring.)

And I did it partly because I did it last year, and I was happy with my harvest this year. By itself that's on par with rubbing the lucky rabbit's foot. Ideally, I would want a scientific/numerical comparison of soaked vs non-soaked done side-by-side for the same year/weather/growing bed/garlic source. Until then I put it under the category of "might help, but really I do it because it makes me feel good."

The separate 5 minute rubbing alcohol soak right before planting was because I was bringing in new garlic from a source I wasn't familiar with and some of the cloves didn't look right (I didn't plant those, but I planted other cloves from the same bulbs.) It's not necessary if you grew good garlic and are planting back, or are planting clean garlic from a source you trust.

Peeling also isn't a must - the paper can help protect the garlic if you have diseases/pests in your soil/MM, and there's risk of damaging the cloves when you try to get the paper off. I dinged a few and had to set them aside for food use, and I may have even caused damage I didn't see. If your garlic cloves are consistently solid/clean, and you aren't bored, peeling probably isn't a great use of time. I fully peeled the cloves that were from new-to-me bulbs, but only did a partial check on cloves from the healthy bulbs I grew myself. 

Roseinarosecity - what went wrong with your previous garlic?

BeetlesPerSqFt wrote:Roseinarosecity - what went wrong with your previous garlic?

I was inexperienced and too impatient, so they came out small and the taste was nothing special.
This year I read an article titled, Growing Garlic In Southern California, written by a local woman in my area so I thought I would give it another try.  Below is the link to her presentation.

http://www.ripealtadena.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/GarlicPresentationSmall.pdf

Rose, I bookmarked the article.

Today I was looking for my garlic and couldn't find it! I know I put it somewhere when the cleaning ladies came the last time, but now I can't find it. I trimmed off the leaves so they aren't as obvious. Not, I didn't put it them the oven this time.

Sanderson:  "I didn't put it them the oven this time." 

At least you have the excuse you can't find it.  I have been looking at mine for 2 weeks, sitting on the table as I go outside to my (you guessed it) GARDEN.  Never even see it.  I had 4 whole days to get it done and STILL didn't. 

What is the latest I can plant it?  

I think you are a little late, but go ahead and plant them in squares you won't need until June or later.  This will be your "experiment."  I think Audrey plants them whenever she is running low. ??  She had a lot of room, though.