Onions and Garlic

Yesterday I lifted most of the Red Candy Apple onions and all of the Inchelium Red garlic. This is the space that they had occupied. A couple of weeks ago I pulled the drip lines that flanked the onions and the Inchelium Red garlic and allowed them to start drying in the ground. After lifting the onions and garlic yesterday I pulled the drip lines that flanked the Spanish Roja garlic that you can see beyond the garden fork. The Spanish Roja matures a bit later than the Inchelium Red. The drip lines that you see in the open part of the bed are the ones that used to be running through the Spanish Roja. There's still a few Candy and Superstar onions in the ground to the left (the ones that didn't send up flower stalks) and a couple of Red Candy Apple further down, the necks on those started to flop over a bit later than the Red Candy Apples. Floppy necks are sign that the onions are mature enough to harvest and cure for storage.

Below are the onions and garlic drying on a screen that I cobbled together from some old wire fencing, boards, and rebar stakes all of which are perched atop a few big plastic pots weighed down with rocks. This is when I wish I had a couple of saw horses. I had read that you don't want to pull the onions and garlic as that my damage the roots and necks which could allow pathogens to infect the bulbs thus shortening their shelf life. It's ok to cut off the roots and necks after they have cured, but doing so too early can also lead to infections, but you don't have to trim off the roots and stems at all if you don't want to. These are sweet onions so they don't keep as long in storage as "keeper" onions and so I want to maximize whatever storage time is possible.

I laid the onions across the mesh, but pulled the garlic tops through the mesh so they are hanging upside down. I don't know if it matters that the tops aren't clearing the ground, it probably doesn't because the soil is dry. It looks sunny there but it's in shade or part shade all of the time.

I'm amazed at how large some of the onions got to be. This is one of the largest.

And the garlic really plumped up as well.

The garlic and onions will be weighed and tallied when they are cured and cleaned or as I use them. This is my first time trying anything other than scallions or bunching onions so I'm really happy with how the onions did. I'm really happy with the garlic as well, I had big problems with rust a few  years ago and almost gave up growing garlic, I did give up for one year and last year the garlic was only so so. It's nice to have a good crop for a change. I doubt that I can take any credit, the extra dry winter this year probably kept the rust from running rampant, it's there this year, it just hasn't been lethal.