2023 Garden Thread

jact55 said:
Give me a day or two to compile my info. I have pics and such of the process and kept good track of it.
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Awsome, yea I'm thinking project for next winter, so no rush. I have a family friend who did a lot of custom LED stuff for my shop but I feel kinda guilty strapping him with another project.
 
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Tallguy said:
My onions were doing great until I got onion maggots in the garden. Now every onion or garlic i plant gets infested. The onions die, the garlic is weakened.

Wish I could get rid of them. Don't want to use pesticides.
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I remember reading, I think it was in Carrots Love Tomatoes to not plant onions in grids for this very reason. It will help save the crop if you get an infestation.
 
Tallguy said:
My onions were doing great until I got onion maggots in the garden. Now every onion or garlic i plant gets infested. The onions die, the garlic is weakened.

Wish I could get rid of them. Don't want to use pesticides.
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Remove and dispose of onion culls and volunteer onions. Avoid planting successive onion crops without rotating to other crops. Avoid planting onions near fields where onions were recently grown, or fields that are located near onion cull piles. These fields most likely harbor overwintering onion maggot pupae
 
mcswny said:
I remember reading, I think it was in Carrots Love Tomatoes to not plant onions in grids for this very reason. It will help save the crop if you get an infestation.
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Ues that is common rotation and companion planting practice. Carrots around tomatoes is also a great practice especially if your soil composition is such that it crusts preventing water penetration- the carrots work like a funnel to channel water into the soil. It beats hand watering multiple times to prewet the soil (dry sponge analogy.
 
FontinalisFin said:
Your onions look really well bulbed. This is my first year doing onions and I have scoured the net looking for the proper time to plant outside. Well we have snow forecast again for this weekend 🙄 and our ground is slop. Everything I can find says plant by March 15 because they start bulbing when daylength is around 14, which is end of April. Have you found that if you don't get them planted early enough you get tiny bulbs? I'm growing walla walla and newberg.
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I just plant them around mid May and it works. Couple of things I do:
Talon onions from Territorial Seeds. Start in the greenhouse (going now) and plant them as I would onion sets. Good storage variety.
Bone meal and some magnesium sulfate in the hole at planting.
Side dress with same around mid July or so.
Pull and air dry
These I still have from last year:
1024D0A5-7D87-4D5F-909F-54B0C0DFFB95.jpeg
 
Tallguy said:
My onions were doing great until I got onion maggots in the garden. Now every onion or garlic i plant gets infested. The onions die, the garlic is weakened.

Wish I could get rid of them. Don't want to use pesticides.
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You might try cayenne pepper in the soil
Diatomaceous earth might help
Predatory soil nematodes
Companion planting
Crop rotation
And as a last resort without the use of pesticides remove and replace the soil
 
Tallguy said:
My onions were doing great until I got onion maggots in the garden. Now every onion or garlic i plant gets infested. The onions die, the garlic is weakened.

Wish I could get rid of them. Don't want to use pesticides.
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Looks like all the bases covered here, except I like the wood ash or diatomaceous earth method, I'll give that a try this year as an experiment, maybe leave 1 area untreated and see what happens.

Screenshot_20230329_105058_Chrome.jpg
 
Dr. Magill said:
I just plant them around mid May and it works. Couple of things I do:
Talon onions from Territorial Seeds. Start in the greenhouse (going now) and plant them as I would onion sets. Good storage variety.
Bone meal and some magnesium sulfate in the hole at planting.
Side dress with same around mid July or so.
Pull and air dry
These I still have from last year:
View attachment 59751
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I looked up the talon variety and it is also long day so I dunno where all this info about day length is coming from, or if it really matters that much. One garden I watch on the road to work everyday plants onions every year and they haven't put them out yet, haven't even tilled yet so this gives me hope. (y)
 
FontinalisFin said:
I looked up the talon variety and it is also long day so I dunno where all this info about day length is coming from, or if it really matters that much. One garden I watch on the road to work everyday plants onions every year and they haven't put them out yet, haven't even tilled yet so this gives me hope. (y)
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You could see what zone you’re in
I go by the seat of my pants mostly
 
We planted ours last weekend, a storage onion and some walla wallas. Did some in containers, some in ground. March is the typical month for planting onions in western washington, once soil temps are 45⁰ -50⁰ or so.
Planted about 125 or so, probably a bit on the early side, but onions are pretty forgiving so not too worried...things are a bit dry right now, so yeah...doing some watering of the containers to be on the safe side.
:)
 
The way I look at it is the weather has been so unpredictable lately it all seems like a bit of a toss up so I’ve been going late on everything
 
I have snap peas and garlic that appear to be doing well so far. I finished building two new raised beds that add considerable space to what I had previously. I plan to plant them this weekend. Maybe I will take some pics, though most likely not lol.
 
Two sizes of upsizing pots thus far. Shooting for mid May in the ground but with a remay hoop cover through and into June0000078A-A8E5-415E-940E-700A1552068E.jpegBAD7724F-7943-4EA7-B609-24D0F2695012.jpeg

This season this year is a perfect example of the 3 week shift of season in SW Wa that i have observed since the late 70’s when i started growing organically and saving seed to grow. But we do get it back in the fall. First fall frost here is about 3-4 weeks later… generally
 
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Recharging the beds.
Adding oly fish compost (made in Bremerton, I think the best bagged compost).
Worm castings.
Down to earth 4-4-4 veggie blend fertilizer, lazy, usually I blend my own mixture.
Then a mix of basalt, glacial rock dust, jersey green sand and a little gypsum. Cause minerals are good.

Mixed up in there.

When I warms up a little, i'll drench in worm castings tea to get the microbes boosted.

Love me some soil.

20230401_093310.jpg20230401_093920.jpg
 
I want to give a shout out to this guy. True soil scientist. Figured it would be some rasta weed growing dude when I found the site. But not the case. A huge help with soil.
And I can buy quality soil by the yard cheaper than I can make a comparable product.

If anyone's trying to fill up raised beds in spokane area, might be worth a look.
Hidden back in a residential area....


Marlé Worm Growers

Pacific NW #1 supplier of custom soil blends, worm cast, red worms, organic soil amendments, and organic garden seeds! Local to Spokane Valley, Washington.
marlewormgrowers.com marlewormgrowers.com
 
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