I've just done this short post on understanding the different types of lime and some of their uses on the Paleotechnics blog. I'm cross posting as I though that it would be of interest to some Turkeysong readers, so hop on over and take a look.
http://paleotechnics.wordpress.com/2013/03/04/understanding-lime-an-introduction-to-forms-of-lime-and-where-they-come-from/
Here are my tasting notes from mid to late season. The Late season extends quite late here with Lady Williams coming in at the end of February. For notes on earlier apples and my thoughts on tasting and evaluation in general, see the previous post, Red Astrachan to King David. I did not review every apple I tasted this season. If something was really good, I'm inclined to mention it, but I feel I need more time to live with many of them before I make any judgement at all. Young trees don't always produce exemplary fruit, and it can be difficult to judge when to pick and eat apples. I also reserve the right to change my mind in the future as I encounter more specimens of various apples and maybe find new benchmarks for comparison. And, as always, what does well here in sunny (often hot) Northern California might not do so well where you live, and vice versa. This time around I’ve stuck mostly to apples that I did actually really like, or had a lot of, and passed by many that were just not that interesting. Some of these fruits are presented in the order of ripening, and some aren't... if that makes any sense... if that doesn't make sense, I guess I'll just give up and get on with it.
Old Nonpareil: Light, juicy, pleasing, easy to eat. Old Nonpareil has been very enjoyable eating this year. Old Nonpareil has a difficult to describe quality that makes me think of some candy that I can’t remember, if it ever even existed in the first place. It is not particularly intensely flavored or rich though, and is more along the lines of a light refreshing pleasant apple. Everything seems to come together pretty well for an enjoyable eating experience. It has something of a citrus quality, but I’m not sure if that's due mostly to the acidity or actual flavor compounds in the citrus realm. Either way, citrus comes to mind, and not just to my mind. Like many old apples, it is not crisp or crunchy. It is alleged to keep well, but we didn’t have enough to try keeping any, especially since they seem to be prone to dropping from the tree before they are ripe. The branch is in the shade and this is it’s first year bearing significant fruit, so I’m not sure the fruit is exemplary. For now I’ll look forward to eating them when I can get them, and will probably graft a branch in a sunnier location for further evaluation.
Wickson: Hella intense flavor in a tiny sugar filled package. YUM! This tiny apple is named after then famous California Agronomy champion Edward J. Wickson, who had a large impact on agriculture in the state early in the 20th century. Albert Etter must have recognized great quality in this fruit to name it after his friend and associate, who was an important figure at the time. Everyone loves a Wickson. Early in the season it did taste a bit oddly like crab (it is a crab apple after all), but the seafood element faded as the season moved on. The latest specimens, though cracked from fall rains, were intensely flavored with insane amounts of sugar. It is difficult to describe the flavor of Wickson, so I won't try, but it really is awesomely, rich and unique. The only apple I've had that was close to similar in flavor is Crimson Gold, another Etter variety, which is also delicious, though not as intense. (edit: tonia says that if an apple could have umami, it would be wickson. Adam of Adam's Apples blog describes one of the flavor components as malt. I know what he means, though I wouldn't say that specifically, and haven't been able to characterize that flavor by comparison to anything else.) I've heard two people this year say that if they could have only one apple it would be Wickson... one was a fruit expert and one was my mom. During a talk on apples and apple growing, when asked what trees he would recommend planting Tim Bates said with confidence and practically before the question was finished, "WWWICKSON!". He also added that when interns stay on the Apple Farm, Wickson is always their favorite apple by the time they leave. Find one to eat, graft a branch, graft a tree, graft two, Wickson rocks!
Karmijn de Sonneville: Ginormous cox decendent. I tasted this Cox’s Orange Pippin/Johnathan cross from September through late October at least. Most of my notes are very positive, though my memory is not equally positive. The apple is very tart and that characteristic never mellowed much. Karmijn de Sonneville had very bad watercore on frankentree the first few years, but seems to be getting over it now that the tree is bearing more regularly. The tree that I planted of it in the garden orchard had horrible watercore this year and not a single good apple was harvested. I’m hoping it will come around as the tree matures.
here are some excerpts from my notes on Karmijn de Sonneville:
Oct 15th riper now. still very tart, probably too tart for some. Delicious though. citrusy with other fruit flavors. Very juicy, pretty rich, fairly complex. The perfect apple for people who like to chew on lemons, it has a sensational level of tartness with strong undercurrents of relatively complex flavors. Add to this a great texture and lots of juice and no wonder the Karmijn de Sonneville is a common taste test winner.
Oct 29th very good. Citrusy, pretty tart, yummy coxlike thing.
Grenadine®: a fun apple that tastes as red as it looks. Grenadine® is a rather obscure apple bred by Albert Etter of Ettersburg in Humboldt County California. He was working on red fleshed apples, and this is the reddest of those available. Grenadine® has one major issue (texture) and probably would not have been released in Etter’s time... and wasn’t. Still, it is a remarkably flavorful apple with strong berry or fruit punch flavors. Everyone seems to love it, and I’m quite fond of it myself. The flesh is very dark pink, bordering on red. The longer it hangs into early winter, the more intense the flavor becomes, but it also becomes more mealy. Last year it was not as mealy as it is was this year. It requires a long season for ripening. This year it was probably at it’s best compromise between mealy and fully flavored around mid November. I haven’t tried all the red fleshed Etter apples that are out there, but my guess is that another couple of generations of breeding would have yielded better specimens than are available now. Greenmantle Nursery maintains a trademark on the name and doesn’t want anyone growing it without buying the trees exclusively from them and signing an non-propagation agreement, thus all the little ®'s. As a result, the apple is very uncommon, but cuttings of it show up at scion exchanges, and it is not patented.
The apple formerly known as Rubaiyat®?: Red flesh, red flavor, more please! This is the Albert Etter apple trademarked as Rubaiyat® by Greenmantle Nursery. The fact that Greenmantle limits propagation and demands royalties under that name serves as a disincentive to use it. Perhaps if it had another name it could become popularized and thoroughly assessed by apple collectors and fruit growers, and could possibly even be found for sale now and then. I had just a few of these on frankentree this year. Many dropped from the tree prematurely and only one really fine specimen was harvested. That specimen was, however, delicious! The Texture is open and juicy with berry like flavors common to Etter’s red fleshed apples. Grenadine® has stronger flavors, but this one seems to have better texture and is generally a more refined fruit. I’m reeeeally looking forward to taste eating more of these.
Becca’s Crab: Tiny, crabby, but yummy. My buddy Becca the farmer sent me some scions of this from North Carolina. Apparently in came out of a university research orchard or something like that. She said it made great cider. I distributed some to other apple collectors and cider makers. My scions died when a piece of frozen meat was set on them in the refrigerator, but one single bud miraculously lived. It didn’t even grow the first year, but did the following year and it fruited quite a bit this year. The apples are about an inch in diameter, beautifully red, round, with a deep yellow/orange flesh. I ate some in the fall and more later in the December and January. They hung well without going really soft. A few were left hanging on January 1st, but many were starting to rot. I picked them and the few that were still good were delicious. The late ones had a lychee flavor as tonia pointed out. The earlier ones were reminiscent of cherries, especially when eaten seeds and all. It is a little crabby, with a marked astringency and it can also be somewhat mealy, but given a pile of them, I would probably eat a lot. We’ll see what I think of it after living with it a few years. If it makes great cider too, which seems not unlikely, I’d say this is a pretty swell little apple. I may actually graft a whole tree of it. Wish I had a few to munch on right now. I wouldn't be surprised if this is a common named cultivar, but I don't know my crabs, so... Does it look familiar to anyone?
Pomo Sanel: Local discovery falls short... This apple hung really late. I picked the last ones on January first. The texture was still firm. The latest specimens had some skin blemishes and pitting, but were not rotting or anything like that. The flavor is fairly rich, but not complex being dominated by a banana like flavor. Banana not being my favorite, I found them inedible, even though I kept trying to eat them. Suffice to say, the Chickens got to eat a lot of them. Too bad because I am looking for late hanging apples. This is probably an old known variety, but who knows, it might be a local seedling. It came from a scion exchange and I believe the bag said it was from an old homestead or farm in Talmage. I assumed that it was named by whomever collected it. I would not say it was a bad apple at all, but just not excellent and not to my tasts, so I will not continue growing it.
Newton Pippin: A most praised and praiseworthy apple. (a.k.a. Newtown Pippin, Albermarle Pippin): There is a tree of this famous American apple on the property next to us. I grafted it onto frankentree some years back because the old tree is so decrepit that I figured it didn’t have long to live. In fact, one of the three trees I took cuttings from fell over and died within a year. I had a few late harvested apples off the remaining Newton Pippin this year, and it they were similar to other good newtons I’ve had. There is a strong fruit flavor like jolly rancher candy, sometimes the watermelon flavor and sometimes just generic fake candy flavor. I’m very intrigued. I’ve been told numerous times that Newton will not do well here, but I’m not convinced. (Recent conversations with local growers indicate that it probably does fine here, but that it may take a very long time to come into bearing and is scab susceptible.) Interestingly, the apples that I harvested off frankentree, which were grafted from the original tree are not nearly as flavorful. Still, they were quite good and when eaten out of the fridge in late January were of a very welcome quality. I’m also looking forward to trying a couple of highly rated offspring of the Newtown Pippin- the Virginia Gold (Golden Delicious X Newton) and the New Rock Pippin, an English seedling of Newton Pippin purported to keep extremely well. Virginia Gold scions just arrived and I’m working on getting New Rock Pippin into the country with the help of apple super enthusiast John Gasbarre of Lamb Abbey Orchards. The Newton Pippin has an interesting history, but I’ll save all that for another time and place. for a little more on Newton Pippin check Orange Pippin.
Hauer Pippin: Hoped for better, still hoping... I’ve been really excited to try this apple, but it turns out I’ve been trying it for a few years under the pseudonym of Rose Pippin. I planted a semi dwarf tree of it on recommendation from a friend in Santa Cruz County who is especially fond of it and knows his apples. Axel of the Cloudforest Cafe is also very fond of it. To me, it did not have Wow flavor and it didn’t actually store that well. The texture after a short time in refrigerated storage was bordering on mealy. The flavor is hard to describe. There are some subtle notes of cinnamon candy that I like, but the dominant flavor is somewhat peculiar, very subtle and impossible to nail down. It’s almost more of a sensation than a taste, like alkalinity or acidity are. I’ll try this a couple more years and hope that it comes around. Maybe I have to pick it earlier and store it, but so far, not so good, although it hangs late and is not a bad apple by any means when it is still firm. I just want more out of it if it’s going to have a whole tree to itself.
More on the Hauer Pippin by Axel Kratel here:
Lady Williams: Super late and quite tasty, Lady Williams scores more points! Lady Williams was encouraging this year. One tree was drought stricken (no water and heavy competition from a huge Poison Oak bush) and had poorer quality apples. The apples off frankentree were much better. As usual, they ripened late January, being pretty prime right around Feb 1st. Lady Williams is a tart apple, but by the time it is really ripe on the tree, the high measure of acidity is balanced by a shit ton of sugar! It is a very sweet apple. Flavor is also strong and I guess I would say fruity for lack of any specific descriptors. The one odd flavor I picked out was on the drought stricken tree, Oregano of all things. Those fruits were very stunted though. Lady Williams is a descendent of Granny Smith and the parent of Pink Lady, which seems to be the best supermarket apple out there. The Lineage is... French Crab begat Granny Smith, begat Lady Williams, Begat Pink Lady... Lady Williams looks like a keeper for sure since it is not only extremely late, but it is quite good as well. It requires this long season to ripen though, which would seem to limit its distribution to only a few areas. It will withstand considerable frost and freezes, but I'm sure there is a limit. We rarely see temps as low as 20 degrees.
Welcome to the Paleotechnics blog. While this blog springs forth from various motivations, the one thing we would like to be sure of is that you learn something when you visit us here. What will you learn? The topics will vary quite a lot, but most will fall in the realm of natural living skills and getting to know the natural world and the articulations of life around us. A few posts may venture more into theoretical realms and philosophy, but again within the same focus on human participation in nature at a basic level using the simple equation- Learn stuff > gather stuff > make things > use the things you’ve made = personal empowerment and greater self reliance. We have well over a hundred potential blog post topics already jotted down. topics will cover tanning skin, stone working, the nature and potential uses of materials, processing of materials, common mistakes, cordage, fire topics, tips and techniques for various skills, plant profiles, wild foods, photo essays and more. Our lives are built around gaining and sharing knowledge, so we're excited to share in this format!
Paleotechnics has always been about de-mystifying and making accessible natural living skills and basic technology. The business manifested as an outgrowth of this passion and continues to strive to empower people to become less domesticated and more self reliant.
Posts will likely be infrequent and short to medium in length. The goal will be to hold subjects to an accessible degree of detail or break them up over more posts. We plan to write much more extensively on some of these subjects in the future. If those plans come to fruition, the books will be available as paper and/or ebook versions.
While this is a business, and we do need to make money, we would like to strike a balance between making a living and providing free information for people with the motivation to seek it out and assimilate it. This blog provides a free service to expand and refine your skill sets. If you want to know more about a subject consider buying one of our publications or taking a class. In classes, we aim to be sure that you will not go away disappointed. Paleotechnics classes are geared toward empowerment through knowledge, and we mean it. Most of our income goes to purchasing Turkeysong, the experimental paleo/homesteading base camp in the Mountains of Northern California where we have access to space and materials to figure this stuff out.
Please visit us again, and consider subscribing to our blog in the side bar, to receive email notifications of new posts.
Chickens have been a constant source of amusement here for the past year and a half or more. We have been testing out various breeds and just seeing how chickens might or might not integrate into the homestead. We are learning a lot, but the main product so far has been entertainment! More on chickens later, but here are a few frozen moments from our year of Chickens. brrrrrraaaaaaauuk.
So that's our year in Chickens. It would be great to hear anyone's experiences with free ranging chickens. We don't have a dog, or fencing, so we've lost quite a few, but they sure are happy running around all over the place scratching the place up. The eggs are great too from all those bugs and plants they eat.
It was an interesting year around here. New projects and continuing old projects. Lots of chickens. So many in fact that I had to split the chicken pictures of for another post... Turkeysong: the Year in Chickens coming soon.
By: Steven Edholm
Need straighter, longer, or more evenly tapered sticks? Who doesn’t? It’s not always easy to find a nice stick when you need one. We might have plans for certain types of sticks, but nature has priorities other than providing us with them, and doesn't necessarily have the same criteria for "better sticks" as we do. Knowing where to look for straight wood, and how to manage plants for the production of such, is essential knowledge in the paleo arts. Now that it's winter, it's time to harvest twigs and sticks for our baskets and hand drills and things like that, so I thought a post on the subject would be appropriate.
What we're looking for: More uniform than average twigs, sticks and staves find many uses. Arrows, hoops, spears, hand drill shafts, basketry elements and bowstaves are some classic examples. There are several characteristics that we are commonly looking for in sticks for making stuff:
Straight (or at least with long gentle curves instead of short sharp bends)
Free of branches
Gradually tapering (i.e. not a very different diameter at the top and bottom)
Long (of course that’s relative)
We may need only one or two of these characteristics, but we would often like to find them all in the same stick.
Nascent v.s. mature growth: Some trees and shrubs grow naturally straight and branch free, but the norm is various degrees of curved, zig zagging and short jointed branches growing in all directions. Many species do however have the capability of growing straight given the proper stimulus, resources, and conditions.
When trees and shrubs grow from seed, they get off to a slow start. Each year, the seedling root system gets bigger foraging nutrients and water underground and storing some of those resources for spring growth. A few seedlings luck out and get the best spot ever, growing rapidly upward, but growth in seedlings is slow as a rule.
Even with the resources gathered by a large root system, more mature trees and shrubs typically grow slower with short joints and crooked branches. This is largely due to the fact that there are so many branches competing for those resources. The growth of a plant is largely determined by competition with itself. If we reduce competition, we can channel an abundance of growth energy into fewer growing points- enter nascent growth...
Nascent growth is fast vigorous growth. The defining factor is that is has access to resources for rapid extension of the shoot during the growing season. There can be numerous reasons that the shoot has access to the food and water needed for rapid growth.
One way the shoot may gain advantage in the structure of the tree is by it’s placement relative to the physiology of the tree. The shoots known as water sprouts, or suckers, on fruit trees are a good example that many people are familiar with. Hormones within the tree can suppress or encourage growth and the water sprout has managed to bypass the growth suppression hormones taking a large share of food for it’s growth.
Conditions conducive to nascent growth: Dormant buds can be stimulated to grow by a change in the position of the branch or trunk. The tips of branches and trees usually send growth suppressing hormones down to stunt growth of lower branches, while continuing to grow taller themselves. This phenomenon for the sciencey among you is called Apical Dominance. Lower branches, guided by hormones from above, make less vegetative growth and typically do the work of reproduction, producing flowers, fruits and seeds. If the position of the branch changes, say if a trunk falls over to a horizontal position, or a branch is bowed down heavily by snow, is bent low by a heavy fruit load or is pinned down by a fallen tree, the buds along the top of the branch are now higher than the other buds on the branch. No longer receiving the “no grow” hormonal message from above, they grow like crazy often causing a mass of long straight shoots reaching for the sky.
Aside from fallen trees and bent down branches, we can look to some other natural phenomena for opportunities to gather nascent shoots. Fires and floods can provide these opportunities. Natural fires are common in many areas and not uncommon in most. As a result many plants are fire adapted. When they are burned over, most trees and shrubs can sprout back and grow new structures from their well established root systems. After a fire, the root resources that supported the whole plant are now channeled into fewer shoots causing them to grow rapidly to compete for light and outgrow predators. It is in the best interest of the plant to reach a mature stature and begin reproducing as quickly as possible.
Floods provide a similar effect by damaging the above ground portions of plants, though often the shoots will grow in response the plant having been bent over by flood waters rather than torn away. Plants that grow along river banks and sandbars are well adapted to flooding and usually produce copious shoots after a high water winter.
Practices for encouraging nascent growth: Practices for managing plant growth are used the world over in traditional cultures and must stretch very far back into the past. It should be no surprise as it is easy enough to put two and two together when observing natural phenomena. Now that we know some phenomena that cause nascent growth, we can use management practices to encourage shoots when and where we want them.
Coppicing and pollarding are practices in which the plant is cut back very hard during the dormant season, removing all growth since the last harvest. The only difference between a coppice and a pollard is that in pollarding a trunk and/or a branchlike tree structure is maintained but headed off at the same point periodically, while coppiced plants are cut at ground level. Some plants that coppice well, such as willow and osier dogwoods, can be cut to the ground every year for basketry material without suffering any setback, though they are sometimes cut on a multi-year cycle to produce larger material for fencing, fuel, timber or other uses.
Plants can also be burned to the ground to stimulate new growth. This is nothing more than coppicing by fire.
One last method I’ll leave you with is bending. One way to farm shoots on some plants is to bend tall shoots over to a horizontal position, or better yet in a bow shape with the tips lower than the top of the bow. In some plants new growth will sprout up along the bent branch. If the branch is high enough the shoots can have an advantage in outgrowing browsing animals like deer. Browsing could shorten your shoots or cause them to branch or have crooks. I've been told that this method was used to produce arrow shafts of Mock Orange by Indians in Northwest California, but haven't had an opportunity to try it.
How plants grow: There are many factors to consider when deciding what to cut and when, such as population density, make up of the forest, management goals, human use and infrastructure, what animals depend on the plant for their living and so on. Possibly of greatest importance is to know how a particular species grows before you start chopping it down to make sticks. Most plants will sprout readily from the base, but some will not grow back when cut down. Others may sprout back, but will not tolerate continual annual coppicing. Careful observation of natural and human damage to trees and shrubs and their response over time will usually give you the clues you need to get started. Road crews regularly coppice trees and shrubs along roadsides providing useful materials as well as clues to plant responses to coppicing. Recently logged or burned areas are other places to start looking at plant regrowth patterns. It is generally best to cut near the dormant season, anywhere from when the plant growth stops in the fall, to soon after it begins again in the spring.
Given our seeming distance from nature in modern society, it is easy to view cutting down trees and shrubs as inherently negative, as if nature sorts itself out perfectly, but this is not so. Human harvesting and management practices can have both positive and negative effects. Often the effect may be negative for one aspect of the ecology and positive for another... in other words, just different, or possibly more accurately an issue of perspective and values. It is especially true when dealing with logged over land (which is virtually all that is left to us) that some human intervention can have an effect which would be hard to argue as other than positive. These decisions require some knowledge to be effective and we all have a lot of homework and observation to do in order to earn an honorable place in the scheme of things. Natural systems are typically tough and chaotic environments and therefore they and their citizens are for the most part fortuitously resilient. This resilience is amply evidenced by the phenomenon of nascent growth.
A Quick RECAP!
*Straighter, branch free, evenly tapering, long and otherwise more uniform sticks are commonly needed in the paleo arts.
*Many plants are evolved to recover quickly from damage growing up straight and fast. This quick new growth is known as nascent growth.
*Natural phenomenon such as fires, flooding or wind storms can provide opportunities for the harvest of Nascent shoots and trunks.
*Coppicing (cutting to the ground) and Pollarding (cutting higher up on the trunk) are common pandemic practices for cultivating nice sticks.
*Knowing how a particular species grows, and how it fits into the local ecology can keep us from making management mistakes. Plants at all stages of growth help provide this information if we pay attention.
For more information and philosophy on sustainable harvest practice see Paleotechnics bulletin #1: Sustainable Harvest: approaching wildcrafting with knowledge and intent .
The roots of our holiday symbols stretch far back into the past. Greenery and red berries brought into the house are the primary symbols of the holiday season for western culture. These symbols once meant more to people in a time when we need to celebrate, life, hope, warmth and renewal. Madrone berry beads are a beautiful addition when moving towards a sort of holiday vernacular of the west coast region. They are attractive, free, not only safe, but edible, and can be returned to the earth from whence they came when we are done with them. They will last for at least several seasons if well made and cared for.
Paleotechnics usually sells madrone berry garlands and necklaces around the holidays. After years of stringing and drying the berries, we have some tips on making your madrone beads look their best. You may or may not be able to follow all of these tips on berry quality depending on what berries you have access to, but we all have to use what we are fortunate enough to find. We are often asked how we get our garlands so uniform and beautiful. The answer is attention to detail as in so many other pursuits in life. So, here are those details and a few other tips.
*Use red string. Red embroidery thread doubled up works very well. We have rarely had to buy it new since it is often found in thrift stores.
*Sort your berries carefully avoiding berries which look at all sooty or splotchy. Sooty berries can get sootier as they dry. Small black specks are common as well. The specks will not grow in size, though they will be very visible on the dried berry.
*String similar sizes together. Remove all the berries from the stem and then string the largest berries from a double handful at a time. Put the berries on a flat tray or dish one layer thick so that it is easy to see the different sizes. Once the largest berries are strung from that double handful, dump them into a separate container and grab a second double handful, string the largest from that lot, and so on. That way each round through you are stringing the next smallest size of berry. If you want to get fancy, you can taper them from small to large, etc.
*Thread through the stem end and as straight as possible.
*String several berries onto the needle before moving them down the string. This trick just saves time.
*String about a foot of berries near the needle and then scoot them to the end of the string by moving them down one handful at a time, another time saver.
*Once the berries are all strung, go back through them and remove crooked ones.
*Snug the berries up close together. don’t squish them, but you want them uniformly cozy.
*Dry quickly. Dry the berries quickly. Very slow dried berries can turn black and begin to decay. Hanging above a woodstove or heater is a perfect way to get them dried fast. It can still take a week or more, but the sooner the better. Avoid direct sunlight to retain vibrant color.
*Don’t move the berries on the string once they begin drying. Seat the berries snuggly together on the strand, hang them up, and leave them alone to dry. The berries will shrink and stick to the string spacing themselves evenly.
*Store the garland away from mice and insects and away from direct sunlight.
*And finally, watch out for Kissing Bugs! Kissing bugs are a parasitic biting insect that really likes living on Madrone berry clusters. They commonly feed on birds and birds love madrone berries, so that probably explains why they are so commonly found there. They are around 3/8 of an inch or smaller. I’ve never been bitten, but they are very common. I recently sorted the berries off of three plastic shopping bags full and found as many as four in one bag. They will usually stay on the berry clusters rather than venturing off, but I like to remove the berries from the stems outside, so the bugs don’t end up in the house. I examine each cluster carefully before I start working with it, but still keep my eyes peeled as I’m working. They are difficult to spot. The Bugs are blood sucking and often bite near the mouth, thus the name. A study in Arizona found that they frequently carry a parasitic disease than can cause serious chronic health problems. They often bite at night, so you don’t want them in your house! I have never noted them to be aggressive toward me at all, and suspect that they would rather feed on something besides people.
When I started this blog I was going to throw everything together under one roof from music reviews to opinions, to primitive stuff, to how-to homesteading stuff. I like that idea because it represents my life and thoughts as a diversified whole. However, I realize that a lot of people who want to read about chickens and fruit trees might not want to read about the best heavy metal band ever, or other random topics. I’ll probably be keeping this blog pretty focused on homesteady stuff, with suffusions of opinion and philosophy as they are relevant to how and why I do things. For now, less related opinions and over arching philosophies will take a seat on the back burner. I was also not too sure about writing about some of the primitive stuff I do. I’ve decided to open another blog for Paleotechnics. The Paleotechnics blog will be for the paleo stuff, I've been involved with for 25 years or so. Some topics will include, wild foods, tanning and leather working, fire by friction, learning plants, natural glues and paints, fire topics, stone tools and stuff like that. I already have over 125 potential topics lined out. The format will be shorter than the Turkeysong blog for the most part. I’m going to try to keep posts short and less comprehensive. The shorter approach is partly due to the fact that I can only spend so much time on the computer, but also because I plan to (or in some cases already have done) write in much greater depth about many of these topics in the future. It will be difficult to decide where to put an article occasionally. In those cases, I will cross post things like tanning skins that might be of interest to Turkeysong followers. The first Paleotechnics post is up if you want to check it out. It is on harvesting, storing and using California bay nuts.
NOTE: Bay nuts must be properly roasted to be edible to humans. In spite of our best efforts to the contrary, we still commonly encounter people who are not roasting their bay nuts properly. Most commonly, the nuts are not dried before roasting. The second most common problem is roasting too cool. The toxicity of unroasted bay nuts is unknown, but they are probably not good for you. A tickling irritation in the back of the throat, almost like a burning sensation, is indicative of inadequate roasting. Please read and follow directions.)
Bay nut season is starting here in Northern California and it appears to be a good year. They should be raining down from trees up and down the coast for the next month or more. The season varies year to year. Sometimes it will extend into late November or even later. Ripening times also vary among individual trees with some dropping early and some later on. Here are some tips to increase your success and enjoyment with baynuts this year and for years to come! See this article on the Paleotechnics website for a more in-depth treatment of bay nuts and Bay trees. And, look for a definitive book on bay trees and baynuts from paleotechnics by fall 2014! Follow us onfacebook to stay informed.)
*Harvest the nuts in a timely fashion. You don’t want them to either mold, or to start undergoing the physiological changes that happen when they begin sprouting. It’s best to harvest the nuts before the husks are very dried or very rotten. It is easiest to husk them when the outer coating is soft, but not mushy. They are ripe when they begin to drop naturally from the tree. If the husks are too firm and difficult to remove, let them sit around and ripen for a day or three.
* don't put off Husking the nuts: When they are soft enough, husk them.
* Rinse the nuts in several changes of water briefly before drying.
* Dry soon after harvesting. The nuts are easy to dry and may do fine in a warm well ventilated room. If possible though, keep them near a heat source like a heater or woodstove. If the sun is out, put them on the dash board of a car with the windows just cracked or simply out in the sun on trays during the day, bringing them in at night. When fully dry, the nut inside the shell will be somewhat hard and brittle, not rubbery or flexible.
* Store dry nuts in the shells.
* Always dry the nuts before roasting! Roasting the green nuts is a common mistake, it doesn’t work.
* Roast the nuts in the shells. They can be roasted out of the shell, but our experience is that they roast more evenly in the shell.
* Roast quickly, stirring often: Roast at 425 to 475 degrees Fahrenheit. Stir the nuts every 2 to 3 minutes without fail for about 20 minutes so that they roast evenly. Set a timer so that you don’t forget. If the oven heat is at all uneven, as many ovens are, turn the pan 180 degrees a few times during roasting. (Edit: We've been using a popcorn popper to roast lately. Seems to be working very well. See this post.)
* Don’t roast more than you can use soon, and keep the roasted nuts sealed in a small jar or a plastic bag until consumed. They go stale quickly and are best eaten immediately after roasting when they are at their tastiest. Traditional use seems to have been mostly roasted in hot ashes around the fire for fairly immediate consumption.
* Roast them how you like them. As long as they are roasted enough to get rid of the strongly flavored volatile oils that tickle and irritate the throat, you can roast the nuts as dark or light as you like. The color can range from a light brown (the color of coffee with a little cream) to very dark brown. Take some nuts out early and leave others in the oven a little longer to figure out what your preference is.
* Don’t eat too many at once! while tolerance varies, bay nuts do contain a stimulant and can totally wig some people out!
A few additional points:
* Bay nuts are one of the few foods that are high in the rare fat lauric acid, also found in coconut oil and ascribed numerous health benefits.
* The flesh of bay nut husks are edible when ripe. The upper (stem) end of the nut is the best part. The flesh is similar to avocado, to which they are related. It is more of a nibble than a significant food though.
* The fat in bay nuts is very stable being almost completely saturated, so the un-roasted nuts can keep for years.
* Roasted bay nuts make awesome bait for trapping mice and packrats, who can smell them from a long way off and seem to find them irresistible.
Related post: Roasting Bay Nuts in a Popcorn Popper
This has been our best season for apples so far, with something like sixty or seventy of our varieties in fruit. We are through the early season and into the mid season now. What I mainly want to do in this post is briefly introduce some ideas on a philosophy of apple tasting and selection, and then cover some of the more promising apples we’ve eaten so far. I'll include a few notes on some of the less promising apples as well. I was somewhat remiss in taking photos, but I'll try to do better for the rest of the season.
Some varieties bore only an apple or two, and others in enough quantity to get pretty well acquainted. Sometimes it takes a few years in bearing condition for the trees to produce exemplary fruit, so most of the varieties that were disappointing this year will be given a stay of execution to prove themselves of some worth before deciding to convert them to another variety by grafting.
It is also a learning curve to figure out just when to pick each variety. Some should be ripened on the tree and eaten without delay. Others should be picked early and stored for months before eating. It takes some time and experimentation to figure out just when to pick and eat the things. So, in some cases, we were only able to get preliminary impressions, and in other cases, no useful impressions at all. Further, many of the varieties are buried somewhere in the recesses of Frankentree. He has too many varieties grafted on to ripen them all really well. Weaker or poorly placed varieties get buried beneath vigorous branches. That means that some lack adequate sunlight for really good ripening and color. I try to keep that fact in mind when assessing the fruit. Some of the promising types will be grafted out into better locations for further assessment.
Keep in mind that the whole reason I’m doing this is to find good apples; actually, I'm doing it to find the very best apples. But what is good in one place will not be good in another. So, some of our rejects might be the best thing ever under different climatic and cultural conditions. Conversely of course, what is great here might not cut it elsewhere. Still, reviews like this are a place to start in selecting varieties. Our climate is dry in the summer and can get pretty hot with temps regularly in the 90's and reliably above 100 for a few periods during the summer. because it is dry, disease pressure is usually pretty light, but the heat can greatly affect quality in some varieties.
A few notes on tasting. I've spent a lot of time listening very carefully to vintage vacuum tube audio equipment which I collect and repair, and I think I can make an analogy to apple eating. My take home message after a few years of careful listening was as follows. You can sit around and analyze exactly how your equipment sounds, breaking down each variable and measuring by quantity and quality. But, in the end, if the point is to enjoy music, the experience should be taken as a whole and the overall impression on us should be, well,... ENJOYABLE! Simple enough, but easy to lose sight of the forest for the trees as they say. What I primarily rely on in assessing audio equipment now is not whether the sum of the parts should add up, but rather whether they actually do add up. The best question to ask is “do I want to keep listening”? Is the music compelling? Do I want to turn it up, leave it on, sit and listen and get lost in the music. Is there emotive force in the music- does it move me? Am I tapping my foot? Or, on the other extreme, do I want to jump up and turn it off. My overall reaction is what ultimately matters the most if the goal is to enjoy the music. I’m noticing the same phenomenon in taste testing apples for which I’ll use the term compelling.
Am I compelled to eat the apple? That compulsion could come from many complex co-factors. For instance, it could be said that a somewhat mild and understated apple is tame and not very intense in flavor. If my expectations of that apple are too loaded with comparisons to other apples or if I have an over reliance on a few particular traits which I've identified as ideal in a good apple, I might not notice that it’s just really compelling to eat; that, in it’s simplicity as a fruit, there is a formula that simply works. Creston is such an apple. For other imminently edible apples the formula may be quite different. They may demand my attention with intense flavors. I might find myself chewing with great intent and sucking at the pieces to extract every bit of juice from them. Whatever the case, the edibility factor, how everything comes together to make us want to eat an apple, is ultimately the best acid test for apple selection when it comes to eating quality. Paying attention to whether or not an apple is compelling to eat is the most useful single criteria because it brings everything together under one roof if it’s good, or tosses it out on its ass if it’s not. Not only can the complex factors that create harmony, or a lack of harmony, in a single apple be difficult to analyze, but trying too hard to do so can disrupt the experience of eating and enjoying a good apple. Breaking down all the elements into their component parts, while interesting, is ultimately of less real utility than just taking the basic encompassing response of mind and body. Enjoy the Music!
All that having been said, I will of course still be analyzing apples for flavor components and other details like texture and juiciness, along with edibility. There are of course other considerations, but my impressions on cultural traits are sparse as of yet, so they are not addressed here all that much.
One thing I’m learning this season is that there are going to be a lot of apples that have high potential here. Determining those which will find long term favor with us will be a journey. Quality in these matters are always measured in benchmarks. Something can come along which resets the benchmark and changes the whole perspective. Fortunately, with apples there is such a variety of flavor, such a multitude of uses and such a long season, that plenty of room exists on the homestead for variety. With over 200 varieties currently in residence here and more on the way, I think the long list of suitable apples will be pretty long indeed, and the short list may ultimately prove challenging to draw up. It will be necessary to live with the trees and their apples for a longer period of time to come to know them well enough for all of that to jell. Fortunately, the art of grafting allows great flexibility in changing over from one variety to another. For now, we have some losers and some keepers. Will the keepers be kept? or will they get bumped by something better? Give me another 10 years.
So, lets look at some apples:
Red Astrachan, just edible when it's the only game in town. This is our earliest apple by a good stretch being ripe here in the second week of July and done by the 1st week of August. My early impressions were that it was not worth eating. It is an acidic apple, low in sugar and a little sparse on flavor. "Thin" describes it pretty well overall. By the end of the season I had decided I could enjoy eating one when in prime condition and chilled. It is primarily a cooking apple and is alleged by some to make great apple sauce. I think that would be with sugar added. I did a little cooking with it and it seemed good enough I guess. I would like to replace it with something better in that season, but if it’s the best thing going at that time, I might hang on to it. I am collecting as many early apples with promising descriptions as I can to fill this niche. Red Astrachan sets the bar pretty low as a benchmark. Older literature tends to rank this apple higher than I would, so maybe it has more potential in other climates.
Sunrise, Early and promising, but... This apple started out promising. I’m still somewhat interested in it, but by the end of it's short season I was a little cold. It gets points for being early for sure. Sunrise is an attractive apple which has some neat flavors and a crunchy texture which should be popular with modern apple eaters. Flavor hints were green grape, bubblegum (tonia), and later a sugar cane or jujube like sweetness. All in all, pretty tame flavor profile, but interesting when it was prime. It is a sweet apple. I realize that sweet apples lacking in acidity are popular with some people, so those people should take note. I think it is a very good sweet apple at that season. Still, without a balance of acidity it falls flat, and I tend to lose interest pretty fast. If some acidity could be injected Sunrise has a lot of other good qualities considering it's season. I’ll give it a chance for another year or two, but I’m not super hopeful.
Kerry’s Irish Pippin, new benchmark in early apples. This old Irish apple was as early as Sunrise, which is just slightly ahead of Gravenstein. Around here that was second and third weeks of August this year. It is a small apple with a peculiar line running up the side like a seam. Like Sunrise, it gets points for earliness but, as one source said, it’s a good apple at any time of year. I don’t have much to say about particular flavors, but it was quite good, rich for an early apple, fruity, maybe some spice. tonia says dried mango and pear. The texture is, firm and fine grained and pleasant to eat, not particularly juicy, and not the texture that modern apple breeders are aiming for and consumers are coming to expect. All in all Kerry's is the most promising early apple here this year and the new benchmark for such. Tim Bates of the Apple Farm in Philo is a big fan of this apple and I got my cuttings from him. Thanks Tim!
Gravenstein, Could be better, should be better. Gravenstein was not very good here this year. We never got one that was really prime. Part of that is due to bird damage with not a single fruit remaining unpecked. I’m inclined to think that Gravs are great when they are just right, but just before and just after, they are of little account. That "good then gone" character is typical of early apples in general. I’m still hoping for better things from our Gravenstein tree, but at this point I’m inclined to continue grafting over more of it to other early apples. We live not far from West Sonoma County which is famous for growing great Gravensteins. A few samples from that area last year were somewhat of a revelation, but the climate here is significantly hotter and drier.
Golden Nugget, disappointing, but I'm not giving up yet! Another apple that ripened very early was the Golden Nugget. I was excited to try this one as it is a cross between Golden Russet and Cox’s Orange Pippin, two great and intensely flavored apples, and still possibly the most intense and compelling apples I've ever eaten. It ripened in August which seemed unusual, but I read in a forum somewhere that they can ripen very early. It was just pretty good at it's best, which was disappointing, but then it is the first year of fruit on a two year old cordon tree, so I don’t want to judge it too hastily until the tree settles in a bit. The last Golden Nugget I ate was better than those before it, so I'm hoping that I picked it too early or that I just need to store it for a while. Then again, I didn't pick most of them because they fell off. It does get points for early ripening and seemed promising for an early apple if it gets its act together. It is an attractive apple, but not by our warped grocery store standards.
Fiesta (aka Red Pippin), Silly name, satisfying apple. Fiesta is a newer apple as you can tell by the silly name. It is a cross between Cox’s Orange Pippin and Idared. It is earlier than Cox’s here. I don’t have full notes on the season, but I have down that it was very tasty on Sept 15th. The apples are on the large side, broadly conical and attractive. The acid/sugar balance is good to my taste. Flavors are “red apple”, maybe some green apple and some almost artificial fruit flavors which are not uncommon in good apples. I don’t mean artificial in a bad way, but that is the description often evoked. Fiesta is juicy, nicely textured when in prime condition and easy to eat. It has a good balance between keeping your attention while not demanding it or being overwhelmingly intense. I like overwhelmingly intense apples, but I also like to just chill out and eat an apple sometimes without having to pay too much attention. Fiesta is a good fruit for casual eating while still remaining quite interesting if you want to pay more attention. I’m going to slap a label of very promising on Fiesta and look forward to eating more next year.
Cherry cox, better than old Cox. Cherry Cox were eaten through much of September and in storage well into October. The fruits have to be harvested over a long period as they become ripe. This variety has been a real performer here and has bested the famous old variety Cox's Orange Pippin which spawned it. It watercored the first year or two, but has settled in and had no watercore at all this season. Watercore is a physiological phenomenon where some of the flesh and core of the apple becomes saturated looking and generally sweeter. Some people like it. I'm not so keen on watercored apples, and the fruit will not keep. We ate the last Cherry Cox out of the fridge on Oct 17th and it was still pretty good. Cherry Cox is a nice looking sport of Cox’s Orange Pippin (sport meaning it is a mutation of a single bud on a tree which grew into a new variety). It is green fading to yellowish with often dramatically broad red stripes. It is reportedly more disease resistant and longer storing than Cox's Orange Pippin with a taste of cherry. The Cherry flavor is mild in some and strong in others. It’s something like a cherry cough drop, but in a good way. It is on the tart side with rich fruit flavors... strong, but not usually intense. It is a refreshing apple, lively with acidity while still being plenty sweet, and is good for eating out of hand. I did notice that it was sometimes hard to figure out when to pick and eat it at just the right stage. It can get a little bit mealy or granular if it is very ripe, but it can taste a little sharp and raw if too green. The window between seems small and it is difficult to know when to pick since it ripens over a period of weeks. Still, that analysis aside, we ate them and ate them some more, in and on both sides of, that window and would eat yet more if we had them. Because of the flavor as well as our overall desire to eat them in quantity, Cherry Cox seems like a keeper here at Turkeysong . Add high productivity and precociousness into that equation and it’s a real winner. It isn't the best apple ever, but it has a lot going for it.
Cox's Orange Pippin, nothing to write home about :( I had one of these off my mom's tree a couple years ago that really knocked my socks off. I was hopeful after that, but it has disappointed here consistently. I think good years for Cox's would be few and far between in our climate and we are probably better off pursing other apples including some of Cox's many offspring, a number of which are reviewed on this page and excellent in quality.
Sweet Sixteen, flavor you couldn't ignore if you wanted to. Sweet Sixteen is another early to mid September apple. It was finished harvesting by the end of Sept and that was probably a bit late. Sweet Sixteen is from the University of Minnesota breeding program and was released in 1977. It is a nice looking red apple that is intensely aromatic and flavorful. You can smell a good example from several feet away. Apples boast a large palate of flavors and Sweet Sixteen showcases that fact. Early, somewhat unripe, specimens were so intensely flavored of bubblegum and cherry candy, that they were a bit much, especially lacking the sugar and acid to balance the flavor. Later specimens yielded a somewhat more harmonious and less gimicky flavor with notes of artificial cherry, bubblegum, anise, almond and “red apple”. These flavors are generally not subtle, but are right up in your face. It will probably be a bit much for conservative palates causing some upturning of noses, nose wrinkling, grimacing and other signs of disapproval. On the other hand, it must be awesome for kids and certainly for the more adventurous grown ups among us. If apples have to compete with the candy isle, which it could be argued that they do if we want kids to eat them in this age of foods engineered to make us want more, then this is a step in that direction. we’ll be hanging onto sweet sixteen and probably adding a tree. The birds also like it!
Freyburg, Anise and banana flavored, gourmet Chicken food. Although it did taste of anise as advertised, and sometimes strongly, Freyburg is sweet with little acidity. Chuck likes it for that reason though, and other sweet apple lovers might as well. It can taste anywhere from mildly to intensely anise flavored. Other flavors are banana, perfume or maybe flowers, and pear. It has brilliantly white flesh and a sort of creamy flavor and interesting fine texture. As far as I’m concerned this one is out of the running. If you like sweet apples, it’s probably a good if not very good apple, but for me the total of the flavors and sugar/acid balance is curious, but not compelling. Most were picked too early, the last one picked on Oct 22nd seemed like it was probably in just about prime condition. I said Wow when I bit into it because the anise flavor was so strong... but the chickens finished it.
Egremont Russet, a solid old school English Russet. This is a famous English russet with a rough, pretty thick and fairly astringent skin. My notes say it seemed prime on September 22nd, but it ripens over a long season with the last few hanging on till mid October. Egremont was popular with farmer’s market customers who probably would not have given it a second glance if it hadn't been for the tasters we handed out. Most of the people who tasted it bought a few. It is very sweet as many russets are. The texture is dense, but I wouldn’t say dry or rubbery as some russets tend to be. The flavor is rich and dense, but not particularly complex or “wow”. It is sufficiently acidic to be lively in the mouth and the peel is fairly astringent. Egremont seems to be keeping well in the fridge. The flavor and texture of the refrigerated apples a month after picking is very good and hardly changed. The most interesting thing is that the stored specimens don’t taste like refrigerator. Many apples can go into the fridge for only a week or two and come out tasting like a not so delicate blend of everything in there which is a real buzzkill. The tree is somewhat prone to early drops and ripens over a long season. I noticed that the birds pecked at them but didn’t care to eat them, probably because of the dense flesh, so damage remained minimal. I think we might keep the Egremont, but I hope to compare it to some other russets in the next few years. My experience indicates that the Golden Russet definitely trumps the Egremont as it is grown here. I haven’t had any significant quantity of Golden Russets on my trees yet, (blame the packrats who ate one tree down to nubs to build a nest), so I can’t compare site grown apples. Egremont is also alleged to make very good cider which is a bonus.
Rubinette, more please! A cross between Cox’s Orange Pippin and Golden Delicious. It’s hard to find a bad word said about this apple in terms of flavor. We have been very impressed with some of our 10 or so specimens this year. It is richly flavored, balanced and fairly complex. All in all Rubinette is a harmonious eating experience, and that is the take home message for this apple. It hangs on the tree well, but has to be picked before it over ripens. The apples are small and the tree is said to be small and a weak grower. The apples were very nice looking and variable in size from medium-small to smaller. I have only one branch, but am inclined to graft a tree after tasting this years samples.
Chestnut Crab, Delicious and brightly flavored, followed by a hint of rotten nuts and seafood. I was excited to try this variety bred at the University of Minnesota in the 1940s. It grew rather large for us on a two year old oblique cordon and is more like a small apple than a crab. It is a gorgeous apple with flushes and blushes and light russeting over a translucent background. The flavor was encouraging early in the season, lively and rich with plenty of sweetness. The word that came to both tonia and I was bright. I’d like to live with a larger quantity for a while, but I’m pretty sure I could stuff a lot of them down my face... later they were maybe not so good. After just a week or two of refrigeration they developed a taste which is referred to as nutty elsewhere... thus the name of the apple. I would characterize it as odd, more like somewhat rotten nuts and maybe with a hint of seafood. I didn’t care for that flavor much, though It was still really good with cheese. Other people who tasted it responded more favorably, but mostly not. That tasting was on Sept 22nd, so it was probably good for eating to my tastes (pre nut flavor) in early to mid September.
Ribston Pippin, probably not. I may not have picked it at the right time, but this famous apple was somewhat disappointing. I had one late specimen ripened longer on the tree than the rest that was promising, but not great. I’ll give it more of a chance, but I have a feeling that we will not experience the coalescing of attributes that have made this apple famous as it is grown in Britain.
Kidd’s Orange Red, I like the orange, but not the red, next please. Kidd’s Orange Red has a great reputation. It is a cross between Red Delicious, the apple that nearly ruined America’s taste for apples, and Cox’s Orange Pippin the darling of Britain, and probably the most lauded apple ever in terms of dessert quality. Kidd's seems to be pretty popular with apple enthusiasts. I have had the occasional specimen that made me think I should grow more, but in general I’m not that impressed. Kidd’s Orange can be intense and has some very good Cox like flavors at times, but sitting right next to those flavors is the “red apple” flavor of Red Delicious. Some people love that flavor and if you are one of them, Kidd’s is probably worth a try. I find that flavor unharmonious and distracting in this apple, even if I’m partial to it in some other apples. At this point I’m ready to throw in the towel. I’ve had it for a few years and it gets demerits for inconsistency in quality and not suiting my taste.
Not Laxton’s Fortune, but hella good! It typically takes a few years for an apple to fruit from the graft. The first order of business when they do is to note whether they appear to be what they are labeled as. Unfortunately mislabeling is common for whatever reasons. The branch labeled as Laxton’s fortune on Frankentree does not appear to be that at all. It is a shiny, red, blocky apple which looks like more of a modern creation. It tastes like a new creation as well. In fact, it tastes very much like Sweet Sixteen which it also resembles although I have no Sweet Sixteen left for direct comparison. If the seasons weren’t nearly a month and more apart, I would suspect it might be that variety. Anyway, whatever it is, it’s good! It has a very similar flavor profile and texture to Sweet Sixteen, intense almost artificial flavors of candy and cherry flavoring along with a good dose of red apple flavor. Think jolly rancher candy... which one? Maybe a bunch of them mixed together. we’ve only eaten a couple this year, but last year it was a hit as well. It is just ripe now in the third week of October, so I may revisit this one in a later post after I’ve eaten them all! The apples in the picture have writing on them because they are part of a breeding effort.
Suntan, super reputation, so far disappointed, not giving up. This tree has been somewhat of a disappointment. Reviews by other growers are outstanding. Like this one for Stephen Hayes:
“...long keeping apple with a WOW! flavour of tropical fruits and concentrated sunshine. The first time we tasted this apple I ate 5 or 6 non stop until my guts were bursting, it tasted that good. Pineapples, mangos and melons were noticeable among the rich mix of exotic fruit flavours in this delightful fruit.” “Possibly the most underrated apple in England. Today (9th July 2004) Julia and I shared the last apple from the 2003 season-it was a Suntan and it was STILL CRUNCHY and full of flavour.”
My apple guru Freddy Menge also recommended it from his short must-have list. I’m intrigued by our suntan, but not wowed for sure. Part of the reason is that they have watercored very badly the last two years usually fermenting on the tree in the hot sun... sunburn more like. This year a few did not watercore badly, but most did. I’m hoping that the watercore will go away as the tree matures as it has on some other varieties here. The fruit can still be enjoyable to eat and even really good, but good specimens are only occasional and they still taste like they are not up to par. There is a definite flavor of pineapple, which seems to be somewhat intensified by the watercore at times. Texture is often poor. I remember hitting some fractured rock when digging the hole for this tree, so I think it is not in a prime spot. It seems to be lacking in vigor which is not supposed to be characteristic of this variety. I’m not going to give up on Suntan too easily. I’m determined to grow it to perfection here if that is possible.
King David, outstanding and here to stay. This apple is very recommended by local growers and was on several local's must have lists. It is a Southern apple that resists heat, making it useful for interior California. King Davids the past few weeks have been a wonder of Acidity, flavor and sugar packed in a gorgeous remarkably dark red skin that takes a high polish. Mine are dry farmed for the most part, so they are extra intense. There is a high degree of acidity, but it is balanced with an equally high, if not higher level of sugar. Late in the season, the sugars really pour on making it a great apple for hard cider too (higher sugar levels equal higher alcohol levels and apples tend to be low in sugar compared to the grapes used in wine making). Another feature that contributes to King David’s usefulness as a cider apple is a good measure of astringency in the skin due to tannins. Again, this character is exaggerated in mine because they are dry farmed, but astringency of the skin is a good character in a dessert apple. The somewhat strong astringency of King David is appropriate to the intensity of the sugar, refreshing acidity and the saturation of flavor in the apple. I have had Excellent cider made from King David Blended with a Bittersweet apple called Muscat de Bernay and vinted by my friend Tim Bray. It was an excellent fruity, crisp and lively cider. King David is his favorite cider apple. The Flavor of King David has a good dose of what I always refer to as "red apple", but of a broader richness and complexity than other apples dominated by this flavor. It is also suffused with a subtle spiciness. It reminds me of spiced apple juice or mulled cider. Red Apple isn’t always my favorite flavor, but King David's mix of flavors makes it delicious and compelling. It is supposed to be a great keeper, but my storage conditions are not ideal, so we will be eating most of the ones we didn’t sell at the Farmer’s Market. As Tim Bray says, “More King David!”.
I am unimpressed by: Pinata (pinova), Cameo, Cranberry pippin, numerous unlabeled or wrongly labeled apples and probably others I'm forgetting about. Some varieties that fruited this year are clearly too young or too few to make a good assessment, so I’ll wait for another year to speak to those. I hope to post about some late and very late season apples in a future post this winter. (EDIT: I revisited Pinata when a late specimen fell off the tree and was half eaten by chickens. I had been tasting it for months as the apples held steadfastly to the tree, but they never seemed to change much at all. That final specimen had a whole bunch of neat flavors though, so it gets a stay of execution for now.)
"Annual vegetables are like getting a goldfish. Trees are like getting a tortoise that might outlive us."
When we moved here to Turkeysong six and a half years ago, it was a very rainy December. We moved into a tiny trailer with just a propane oven for heat. I was rather unhealthy that winter with long continuing complications from Lyme disease, so my physical resources were limited. But it was an exciting time and full of promise as we embarked on a long held dream. Bathing was accomplished at the nearby hot springs most of the winter until I built a wood fired bathtub which worked passably well. Parking was a mile walk down the 4 wheel drive only road, and the winter was so wet that only two trips were made driving in the 1/2 mile driveway before late spring arrived. I carried office chairs, a desk and sheets of plywood down the half mile drive. I remember many times walking in at night after bathing at the springs, exhausted, sick, dizzy and weak. Most days I spent laying down alone in the damp cold miserable trailer feeling ill and tapped out. The Accommodations were very uncomfortable, but frugality ruled the day and I still knew where my priorities lay. Rather than move toward better shelter, showers, making the driveway passable or other creature comforts, I started preparing to plant trees and put in a garden.
I don’t get why everyone doesn’t see fruit and nut trees the way that I do, or make them a priority. Once established they can give so much for the effort expended in establishment and maintenance. Trees also have a charisma and substance that is of a nature very different than other plants. You can’t develop much of a relationship with a broccoli plant in one season. Annual vegetables are like getting a goldfish. Trees are like getting a tortoise that might outlive us.
Trees currently on the place are 11 Olive, 40 Apple, 9 Sweet Cherry, 2 Pie Cherry, 3 Chestnut, 8? Almond, 9 Carpathian Walnut, 3 Asian Plum, 7 Prune, 5 Feijoa, 2 Loquat, 5 European Pear, 1 Asian Pear, 2 Persimmon, 1 Jujube, 4 fig, 2 chilean wine palm, 1 jelly palm, 1 mulberry and some other odds and ends not counting 55 apples trained as diagonal cordons and a nursery full of trees for next year. After 6 years of planning, researching, planting, mulching, weeding, training, pruning, and occasionally watering and feeding, we are beginning to see results!
I’ve been delighted to see my efforts growing into something resembling trees. Since I do almost all of my own grafting, I’m a year, or even two, behind those buying trees in a nursery. When the young trees come out of the nursery bed the year after grafting, most of them are a single whip, or maiden which is a sapling with no branches around 2 to 5 feet tall, so it is some time before they really take shape and come to a size that suggests they be taken seriously. The spring orchard, which contains most of the trees first planted here, is beginning to take the visual form of an orchard now with some of the trees being 8x8 or larger which is big enough to support a significant crop.
And this year, on the wings of a warm spring, came fruit. Weeks of nice weather had bees out and busy pollinating. The trees were studded with fruitlets thick enough to break branches if they were all left to grow. I’ve delighted in watching my trees develop, cherishing each phase in their development. The graft “taking” and starting to grow is the first victory. A healthy Maiden in the fall is the second. Tucked in place the next spring they wait to begin the first season in the ground. Over the next few years of battling weeds, voles and bark beetle grubs they grow larger, more self sufficient and I can usually take satisfaction in the realization of a strong framework of well placed branches. They begin to bloom, and maybe even set a fruit or two. One day I look at them and they look something like a tree complete with fruit, being off on the right root and leaving their childhood years behind.
Fruit is good. I want to eat fruit and juice it and dry it and make alcohol from it, cook it, can it, ferment it and sell it, but this is not just any fruit! A great share of the energy put into trees here is put into research and planning. The first year my only real resource besides a few other fruit enthusiasts was a book called Cornucopia. It is a really cool book with descriptions of food plants, including varieties. There are a lot of Apples listed in Cornucopia, but even if interested I could not find many of them on short notice and the listing is on the order of hundreds while there are actually thousands of varieties. This person has catalogued 11,324 varieties of Apples! No doubt that number includes some repeats under different names, but no doubt that there are also many varieties missing. I began researching apples in more earnest in the past 3 years. During that time the amount of information about Apple varieties available in cyberspace has grown tremendously. The most useful information is often quite old, especially the mid to late 1800’s, such as Dr Hogg’s The Fruit Manual and up into the early part of the last century like Bunyard’s A Manual of Hardy Fruits More Commonly Grown In Great Brittain, and many more. I’ve spent untold hours researching apple varieties. Much of my down time when I’m too tired to work on other stuff has been spent searching for information and sources on hundreds of Apple varieties. I have fairly extensive data base entries of apple research to draw on and use them regularly. On top of that go notes about growth, tree health, ripening times and tasting of apples grown here. Not every fruit grower needs to be as enthusiastic as the likes of me to grow good fruit, but I can tell you that due care in the selection of varieties pays off.
I research whatever I’m planting generally. I don’t want to leave my decisions up to a nursery owner who may not be familiar with the many varieties of fruits out there. Also, most nurseries are only able to order a limited number of varieties, even though that is improving with renewed interest in heirlooms. Mostly I research Apple varieties because I plant more apples than any other fruit or nut. I’m fascinated by the apple. I long ago recognized the utility and greatness of the apple as the king of homestead fruits. It can be dried, sauced, baked, made into juice, cider, apple butter, dried apples, vinegar, brandy, pies and tarts, eaten off the tree or eaten or cooked after storing for months. There are apples that ripen in July and Apples that ripen in February and probably later... at least 6 months of apples fresh off the tree and I’m confident that this period can be extended.
I’m continually frustrated trying to talk about Apples with people. Its the same conversation over and over. “I like (insert grannysmith, golden delicious, pink lady, honeycrisp, fuji or other grocery store apple)”. “I like a crunchy apple”. “I don’t like mushy apples”. The conversation on apples is generally a limited debate. Its kind of like politics... “I like the Democrats”... “I like the republicans”... “I like one of the two new guys”... Like I said, a limited debate. I want to grab people and shake them and try to get them to listen to me when I tell them what they are missing, but by the time I start trying to tell them they are already telling me that they don’t like mushy apples. Well, almost nobody likes mushy apples, but the range of debate should not be limited to mushy v.s. crunchy and sweet v.s. tart; the world of apples is so much broader.
I like some of the apples I am already familiar with very much, but what I’m doing now is exploring my options- playing the field so to speak. I want to expand the season for apples as far as possible in both directions with first rate apples. That means planting and fruiting a lot of varieties to see what does well here and what suits our tastes. That means a lot of sampling! Some of my best memories of last fall and early winter were climbing into bed of an evening with tonia and an apple or two or three or four and doing some tasting. Sometimes a new one, but always approached as a new one because every one, even off the same tree at the same time, can taste a little or even a lot different. Over the years here I’ve collected around 220 varieties. Frankentree alone has about 140 varieties on him. In total, we have probably 60 or 70 varieties fruiting this year, a new level of apple tasting and eating. Hell yeah, now that's my idea of a good time!
I hope to be finding time to write more about apples since I put a lot of energy into them and I just like to talk about them; and no doubt I’ll be posting about some of the apples we’re tasting this year as the fruits of labor drop ripe and plump into our hands. But I suppose that what I really wanted to communicate here is my excitement at finally seeing my plans come to fruition and how worth it all the inconvenience and labor has been whatever the cost. We are still cooking and scraping by in the same crappy kitchen trailer and sleeping in half finished structures with no real doors or windows, but even if thats the case for another winter, at least we have trees that will be beginning to bear heavily of awesome and carefully selected fruits. The best time to plant a tree really is 10 years ago, but it turns out that 6 years ago isn’t so bad either.
Some parting advice:
*Take any advice with a grain of salt.
*Plant trees sooner rather than later.
*Don’t plant more than you can take good care of.
*Check with the local nursery, but check more with local fruit enthusiasts. Follow up leads with internet research. Many of the best fruits are little known and grown.
*Don’t make caramel popcorn while standing naked in front of a hot wood stove.
*Rarely plant more than one tree of any variety for home use and consider making some trees multiple varieties to span a greater range of seasons and/or tastes.
*Don't discount either Heirlooms or Modern apples. Many of both are excellent and Unique. Heirlooms are romantic, but not always superior. Many of both just plain suck.
*Learn to graft so that you can change trees to new varieties or add to your collection if you find something promising.
*Use the internet to research varieties you are interested in using the terms >> “apple name” apple variety <<. Orange Pippin and Adam’s Apples are a couple of good current sources. Google books rocks the older sources.
*Stay tuned for more hot Pomeography! Including sublimely tempting photos, tantalizing descriptions and verbose romantic ramblings on the virtues and charms of apples!
This page is intended as a source page for acquiring potato onion starts. I will try to update as I get more information. If you know of any source not listed, please contact me. I don’t necessarily vouch for the sources in regards to either service or authenticity, I’m just listing claimed sources, so buyer beware. I don’t have any financial interest in any of these sources, except of course any that I have for sale.
Potato Onions can be fall planted in milder areas with no especial care. They can also be fall planted in cold areas if they are hilled up with soil to cover, but the soil must be pulled away from the plants in the spring so that just the roots are buried and the bulb is sitting at ground level where it will be less prone to rot. Optionally, store until spring and plant then. Some may be lost to decay in storage, but they keep remarkably well in general. I planted some in September this year which had been held over from the previous summer's crop, so they were over a year old. All of that time they were stored under bad conditions including hanging in an often very hot trailer all summer long. Still, they do spoil and it isn't uncommon to lose a number of them right after harvest and then a few here and there through the winter, so for spring planting you'd be better to order in the spring if possible. I'm not sure who, if anyone, ships them in the spring, but maybe I will start doing that. Regardless of all that, you will probably have to order early, because the demand seems to far exceed the supply the past couple years. That's good of course, because more people are growing them and hopefully sharing them.
*I have Potato Onions for sale on ebay through my account Paleotechnics. Demand still far exceeds supply every year, but I grew more this year.
*Seed saver’s exchange: Requires a membership to order starts and seeds from other members. The retail catalog does not have Potato Onions. various varieties are offered by members, though it is hard to say how many are actually different from each other until you grow them.
*Kelly Winterton: Unique new varieties that Kelly has grown from seed. All larger than the standard varieties and seem very promising. Very limited quantities. Contact Kelly at kellys gar den at gm ail dot com
*Heirloomonions.com: These guys appear to be shooting for one stop shopping when it comes to multiplier onions, although, like all other sources so far, availability is still an issue.
*Fedco/moose tubers: carries potato onions. Fedco is my favorite seed company when all things are considered, so check out the seed section as well. http://www.fedcoseeds.com/moose.htm
*Southernexposure: These guys have had them a long time and are probably partly responsible for keeping potato onions alive. http://www.southernexposure.com
*Maine Potato Lady : Sometimes has Potato Onions for sale. https://www.mainepotatolady.com
*http://www.Ebay.com: There are usually some Potato Onion starts for sale on ebay besides mine. I've seen some that look like red shallots, so who knows what you'll get. buyer beware. I ordered some from Canada off ebay that looked different and smaller than the yellow potato onion we grow down here, but I can't be sure because all of the bulbs failed to grow, though they seemed healthy enough. Maybe they had jet lag. (note, a person I'm in communication with had the same canadian yellow potato onions completely fail to root.)
*Territorial Seed Company: If this link doesn't work, try googling "territorial seed potato onions" . They are difficult to find on the site because they are listed as a seasonal product and only sold in the fall.
RELATED POSTS: Mr Winterton's Remarkable Potato Onions, POTATO ONIONS!, The Historic Potato Onion
Amaryllis header
This is an update to my previous post on experiments with fruit tree understories using flower bulbs. I get quite a few page hits from people searching for information about fruit tree understories and bulbs under fruit trees and wanted to get this update out there for anyone who is working or thinking along similar lines. To summarize my project, the goal is to establish an understory for fruit trees which grows up quickly at the start of the winter rainy season to smother weeds, but then goes dormant in late spring/early summer leaving a mat of dead leaves to shade the soil and to slow moisture loss during our long, dry summers. This whole plan is to address specific problems of a Mediterranean climate with wet winters and dry summers, and may not have much relevance to climates with significant summer rainfall. The bulb growing season is about to start again. I'm digging stuff up and figuring out what the next moves are. The bulbs have not filled in enough to be sure of how the experiment is working quite yet, but I have enough preliminary information to warrant a short post on my experience so far. I've planted experiments to just Amaryllis, just Narcissus, Narcissus and Amaryllis mixed, and one that is Snowflakes, Bluebells and Oriental Poppies together. The Oriental Poppies, Snowflakes, Bluebells and almost all of the Narcissus varieties that I’ve tried are now off the list. They either have foliage which is not dense or wide enough, or they die back too late in the season. It is important that the understory go dormant early in the season so that as much water as possible is left in the soil. The Snowflakes and Bluebells die back too late. The Oriental Poppy also dies back late and turned out to make poor cut flowers so it also does not add any economic benefit. The only real contenders I have here at this point are the two original ones- the Chinese Sacred Lily Narcissus in both double and single (see edit below) and the Amaryllis including Naked Ladies and some cool hybrid Amaryllis.
Oriental Poppies under Karmijn
The Single Chinese Sacred Lily is behind the Double variety by at least a year, so it looks somewhat weaker so far and I'm not sure it's going to catch up. Only time will tell. It is also possible that I have Constantinople, a similar flower to the Double Chinese. The single and double chinese are identical as far as I know excepting that the flowers of the double are different, it being a sport of the single type, but maybe they aren't quite..? These small narcissus have the earliest and densest foliage of any of that group I’ve tried so far and they die back quite early as well. By Mid May they were yellowing significantly and they went down pretty fast from there being pretty crispy by the first of June. That’s good because the first of June was sort of my goal for complete die back, although I was skeptical that I could achieve it. The early die back was also in spite of adequate moisture which carried other varieties for at least another month. Early die back in spite of adequate moisture is just what I wanted; a plant that is on it’s own clock, early to bed, early to rise. That should not be surprising though as the Sacred Lily was really my original inspiration for the project.
Double sacred lily under Suntan Apple march 5th
double chinese under suntan apple
The tree that the Narcissus are under, a Suntan Apple, is not doing very well, but I'm inclined to think that its poor performance is due to other factors. I think a few more plantings of the Sacred Lily are in order. The one big bummer about the double version of this flower is that even with a light rain (almost guaranteed in February when they bloom) every single stem bent and fell over. Not just drooped, but kinked in the middle and gave it up. The weight of the water gathered in that double flower is just too much for the weak stems. I do have access to more of the single version, so I may expand those plantings once I decide if they are going to be vigorous enough. they are lovely anyway and they smell awesome. The Erlicheer and Early pearl narcissus did not perform well for the experiment. They don’t seem particularly early emerging so far, and are certainly not early to go dormant.
Double version of Chinese Sacred Lily broken by the weight of rain water in the blossoms. They rarely escape this, so there is little added value as a cut flower for market.
The Hybrid Amaryllis that I purchased from Bill the Bulb Baron have started to send up flowers. So far I've only had some hot pink ones bloom. They are an intense rich pink very unlike naked ladies. These are crosses that Bill has made between the standard naked ladies and some more exotic amaryllis. They should be coming up in other colors as well from white through salmon and dark pinks. The growth from all the Amaryllis is still somewhat sparse as they are just becoming established, but I’ve seen what they can do in other places when well entrenched. It is not uncommon to see patches of them so thick that there are no weeds at all. They come up pretty early and they die back pretty early, though they did die back somewhat later than the Sacred Lily Narcissus. The small bulb sets, or “chips” that I got from the Bulb Baron grew in a garden bed for two years during which time they divided a great deal. The average increase is around 5 bulbs per each planted. With the most prolific bulb having 22 offsets around a nice sized parent bulb. Since I have a lot of them to work with now more will probably be planted under fruit trees this year just gambling that the plan will work. I have taken a few hybrid Amaryllis and Naked Ladies to the farmers market and they seem to be popular enough. I can also get as many Naked Lady bulbs as I want, but I'm not sure I want them now that I've seen the more awesome and unique hybrid Amaryllis. I'm impressed with the Hybrid Amaryllis color so far, although there are quite a few flowers with odd extra petals and accompanying flaws in form, so we’ll see how they look when they are blooming more.
hot pink amaryllis
pale naked lady
One other development here is the arrival of chickens. We currently have 30 Chickens in a range of ages who have the run of most of the place. We hardly have to feed them except for our kitchen and food processing scraps and some kitchen scraps that we pick up from a local source a couple times a week. They eat a lot of bugs and grass seeds and whatever is available around the place. But, in doing so, they predictably scratch and tear the place all to pieces. Part of the understory plan is to have a dying mulch which stays put all summer, but not if the Chickens have anything to say about it. The Suntan apple tree with the double Sacred Lily narcissus under it is now barren dirt. Not a trace of dead foliage remains. With the Chickens under there scratching and eating dropped apples, there is just nothing left. On an adjacent tree they have actually scratched some Narcissus bulbs all the way out of the ground. They are fortunately banned from the garden where a lot of the experiments are planted. It is best though, not to ban them from the orchards completely because they eat dropped apples which are often wormy, helping to disrupt the breeding cycle of fruit pests. Of course the drops can be picked up and thrown over the fence but, except when they are eating my cherries and scratch up my mulch, I like the Chickens foraging in the orchard. I actually knew this would happen and was hesitant to get Chickens because of it, but tonia spearheaded the effort for Chickens determined to have our own eggs and I'm glad we made a move to start figuring the problem out. They don’t just scratch the bulb beds either, but the tree mulch too and everything else. They move a lot of soil around and are having a considerable negative impact moving soil down hill sides, filling in drainage ditches along the road and exposing bare soil to floating thistle and other noxious weed seeds. The ultimate solution may be reducing numbers, but locking them up in a pen all day has become a non-option. I’ve had chickens a lot and these are the most free ranging as well as the happiest and healthiest looking by a long stretch. The egg and meat quality are way above the sad grain fed chicken eggs and meat. We are what our food eats. Still, something will probably have to give eventually. I woke up last night with anxiety approaching terror having dreamed that they had excavated a bathtub sized hole in the hillside. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO...
scratched out bulbs
Barren soil under Suntan
As far as health and function of the trees goes, we don’t have good controls, so it’s hard to be sure of much. My impression so far though is that the trees with bulbs, even bulbs that die back later than desired, are doing alright. The trees are mostly bearing heavy crops this year and it was not the wettest year ever, so the circumstances are somewhat informative if also somewhat sketchy. To summarize my thoughts at this point- being that the primary goals are early heavy foliage, early die back and marketability as cut flowers, the hybrid Amaryllis are looking pretty good. Naked ladies would be second and the double Chinese Sacred Lily (or preferably the single if it catches up) third since I’m not sure the foliage will be adequately dense. I had hoped to find other narcissus that could work, but so far no good. I plan to keep collecting them in the hopes of finding more, but am not that hopeful. If the plan works at all, it will be using very select varieties planted at an adequate density. The quantities of narcissus bulbs involved are large, but once up and running bulbs to transplant or share out will be abundant due the the factor of exponential growth. Bulbs approximately double every year, so that’s 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32 or if one started with 100 bulbs, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1,600, 3,200 in just 6 years. It may not play out just like that in real life, but it gives us an idea anyway. The narcissus will not reproduce that fast if you start with landscape sized bulbs or “chips”. Those smaller bulbs will mature into larger bulbs the first year and then start dividing. The Amaryllis appear to have, on the average, reproduced much faster even when starting with chips. The next 3 or so years should be telling.
EDIT MARCH 2013: The single chinese are not looking as vigorous this season as the double or constantinople, whichever it is, but I'm still hoping it will catch up. All foliage is predictably thicker, longer and denser this year as plantings become established, but they are not yet thick enough to smother all the weeds. That means weeding and or fertilizing etc.. for a few years to establish them as quickly as possible. I was able to plant 5 new trees to the hybrid amaryllis filling a 6 to 8 foot circle under each. I started the project with "chips", the smallest available non-flowering size, and increased them in the garden for two years to about 5 for every 1 planted. Those are good numbers and very encouraging I had also planted a patch under a persimmon tree, so I had enough bulbs to do 6 trees after two seasons of increase, and if I had increased all for two years before planting, I'd have a lot more, probably more like ten trees worth? Unfortunately, I can't remember for sure how many I started with, but I'm pretty sure it was 200, 80 or so under the persimmon and the rest increasing in the garden for two years.
RELATED POST: An Experiment in Using Winter Bulbs to Create Fruit Tree Under-Stories
About half of the Daffodil seeds from my first year’s breeding experiments germinated and grew last winter, including 3 out of 8 Young Love seeds. The plants seemed healthy enough. They grew one narrow leaf each in a flat of soil mix in the greenhouse maturing little bean sized bulbs. The leaves turned yellow in late spring and then brown, wilting down for the summer sleep. By all accounts, Daffodils take a long time from seed to flower, so I have a wait ahead of me until they are ready to expose their pretty faces to the sun the wind the rain the bees and the bugs.
This past blooming season I pollinated yet more daffodil flowers and now have over 400 seeds to show for some minor and mostly enjoyable efforts. I used a lot of pollen from cultivars that I really like, but I was not as selective in regards to the seed parents. I figured there are two basic approaches to this and other plant breeding, careful and sloppy. I have little doubt that an approach using carefully selected stock, keeping precise records, using durable labels, researching the fitness or unfitness of the parents for breeding, and learning to select and breed for desirable genetic traits could greatly increase my chances of ending up with really great offspring. That approach however, sounds about as fun as waiting in line at a bank. I’m sure it’s loads of fun for someone, but I’m not a person that enjoys record keeping overly much. Record keeping and the like are tools that I use to the extent that they are needed, or probably somewhat less than the extent to which they are needed; appreciate it I do, but enjoy it I do not. The other basic approach, and the one I’m currently favoring, is that of sloppy promiscuity and minimal attention to planning, details and after care. You can’t eat daffodils, and I have lots of other projects requiring study time and mental energy, so I’m liking the casual approach for my daffodil breeding. (Edit: This article about daffodil breeder Ron Scamp says that flower form comes from the seed parent and color from the pollen parent. It also says that perianth (petal) colors are hard to cross, but corona colors (the trumpet) are easier to cross. I don't think that's too much information to kill my buzz, so I'll be experimenting accordingly:)
Daffodils are easy enough to pollinate in general. Some of them are sterile or produce very little or no pollen, but from my experiments so far, most of them appear to be fertile. It takes very little time to run around dabbing some pollen here and there, so I don’t worry about who is or isn’t fertile or sterile, or just plain not in the mood. I didn’t even mark the pollinated flowers, but simply went back in early summer to look for fat seed pods. It seems as though Daffodils are almost never pollinated naturally in this environment, so any seeds that form are almost certainly the results of intentional crosses. A few of the flowers pollinated formed no seed. Whether the failures were due to sterile pollen, sterile stigmas or poor timing I don’t know. I had no success at all with the small narcissus types like Minor Monarch, Grand Primo, Golden Dawn and Chinese Sacred Lily, but most others produced at least a seed or two. I probably spent less than two hours to pollinate and then collect those hundreds of seeds this year. Even if my germination rate doesn’t improve over 50% I’m happy enough with those numbers. I do think that I could get more seeds per pod by pollinating the same flower several days in a row, but I’m not going to lose any sleep over it.
Daffodils are generally easy to grow. Under our environmental conditions, I imagine that I could probably take my little bean sized bulbs, put them into barely better than field conditions this fall and expect most of them to survive with only minor intervention. They might not grow to flowering size nearly as quickly as they would with some pampering, but the point is that they will take no extraordinary care to survive and come to flowering age. The bulbs will probably get a small space in the garden for at least a year to increase the bulb size and therefore the probability of survival in the field. The ease with which Daffodils are pollinated and grown, coupled with the fact that I’m breeding for fun rather than for profit or fame, form the foundation of my new low input Daffodil breeding program. So what if I don’t know who the parents of my illegitimate Daffodils are? So what if they take longer to flower because I don’t pamper them? So what if I have fewer awesome flowers and more ugly ducklings? This is about investment and return, not just how much investment and how much return, but about what kind of investment for what kind of return. Instead of fussing with records and tags which may take as much or more time than the breeding and growing, I’m opting to produce more offspring with less and more enjoyable effort. After all, we reap the experience of our labor as well as the fruits. More life, less paper!
I’m hoping that it will take me only a few hours a year to come up with a couple hundred seedlings and a little more time to get them growing somewhere the following year. I’m hoping for 4 to 6 hours a year for 200 or more seedlings each of which holds the promise of unique genetics. I’m thinking of dedicating an area in one of the orchards to be a treasure chest of daffodil seedlings. If I plant more every year, I could have as many as a couple hundred new flowers to check out each season. Once they start blooming, I reap the pleasure and adventure of seeing more of those seedlings come into flower every year resplendent in all their ravishing beauty, mutated weirdness or stunning mediocrity. And even if most are plain or unsightly, it seems like there must remain a pretty decent chance that if I add more every year I could just end up with a flower worthy of the attention of someone besides me. I doubt I’ll be collecting any Daffodil breeding awards, but I’m sure my flowers will make someone pause or smile. I also get to name them which has to be half the fun at least! OMG, I can't wait. I think I'll start a list now. Maybe I’ll change my mind and eventually approach the process with more care. I’ll admit that a few pieces of information about the dominance of genetic traits could prove useful, but I can pick that up anytime along the way and for now the unmethodical approach looks pretty good and more importantly, feels fun instead of stressful.
So the Daffodil breeding blogging saga comes to a pause. Hopefully in a few years I’ll be posting pictures of my motley collection of bastard daffodil seedlings. In the meantime, I don’t feel particularly impatient since my investment has become minimal. I hope the rest of you can stand the suspense though. RELATED POSTS:
This past Spring Kelly Winterton of Utah, an amateur gardener turned onion breeder, generously sent me 8 bulbs of his new Potato Onion the Green Mountain Multiplier. This newly introduced variety was grown by Mr. Winterton from seeds of the Yellow Potato Onion. Potato Onions don’t go to seed very often, but some years back his did go to seed and he was adventurous enough to plant the seeds to see what would happen; what happened was new larger Potato Onions in several different colors. The Green Mountain was the first to be shared out to other people. Most of the others are still under selection and propagation with one new White variety being offered this year.
Kelly has said that every new variety he is growing from the seeds of the Yellow Potato Onion have been larger than the parent. He thinks the greater size of the new onions may be due to freedom from virus that the Yellow Potato Onion has picked up over it’s very long career. Since Potato Onions are grown from divisions instead of seed, it seems plausible that they could accumulate virus. Plants grown out from seed apparently do not carry on viral infections of the parents, so growing from seed would be a way to potentially “cleanse” the Potato Onion occasionally. The other method I know of is to heat the plants until the virus dies, sort of a fever. I’m not sure if the fever technique would work for an onion, but it is used on fruit trees. The viral theory seems plausible, but whatever the case, the onions are truly large for potato onions.
When I received the bulbs in spring, they were very firm and did not look like they had suffered in storage over winter in the least. I grew them out as usual without any overly special coddling. The largest specimens are over three inches in diameter, and there are quite a few pretty large ones. The Smallest one is one and one eighth inches. Coincidentally, I also have the largest Yellow Potato Onions I’ve ever grown this year, but out of a pretty big crop, none are quite as large as the Green Mountains. My larger than usual Yellow Potato Onions are due for the most part to my deliberate planting out of the smallest onions from last year’s crop which makes for fewer, but larger onions.
Results are somewhat preliminary as this is the first year, but the Green Mountain Multiplier also seems to be somewhat more consolidated under the skin than the Yellows. To explain, the Potato Onion is made up of many “eyes” or points of growth which can be seen if the onion is sliced crosswise. Each eye is a growing point and can sort of be seen as it’s own plant or division each of which will grow into a new onion also with a number of eyes. Often, papery divisions will develop in the onion, especially in storage making each onion composed of several which can sometimes be divided before planting. Thats fine, but it can be a hassle when cutting the onions for cooking purposes because the papery divisions have to be removed. My early impression when the original bulbs arrived, and were planted, and again at harvesting is that the Green Mountain bulbs have fewer of these papery divisions. That is a good thing in terms of processing them in the kitchen, and not likely to be a problem for planting.
My Potato Onions have produced seed this year as well, and I’m excited to plant some of them to see what I come up with. Typically though, reluctance to send up flowers at all is one of the Yellow Potato Onions best known traits. For instance, I have been growing them for over 10 years and have only seen them flower one other time. Kelly thought it might be a good idea if the onions produced seed more often so that they could occasionally be purged of virus. I’m inclined to think that it would be better to retain the Potato Onion’s reluctance to produce flowers and learn to induce flowering when we want it. As I said in edits to my previous post about Potato Onions, I was trying to get mine to seed this year. How much of them going to seed had to do with my attempts at forcing them, and how much to do with some other serendipity, I don’t know, but I think that if they do it but rarely, we ought to be able to make them do it more frequently by some sort of manipulation. Anyway, this is all a segue to say that while a number of my Yellow Potato Onions went to seed this year, the Green Mountain Multiplier did not. More growing seasons will be required to see just how the seeding (or lack of) trait plays out in the Green Mountian Multipliers.
Of the 8 bulbs Kelly sent me, all survived well and I now have 56 onions for planting next year. Well, I might eat ONE of them to see how they rate in the flavor department, but 55 anyway. That increase is an average of 7 per bulb planted. This will vary, because larger bulbs produce more smaller onions and vice versa, but --- is probably a good average. In that case 55 should yield around 385 bulbs the second year and if all bulbs were to be planted from there out the numbers would look like: year 3= 2695 bulbs, year 4= 18,865 bulbs, year5= 132,055 bulbs, year 6= 924,385 bulbs and year 7= 6,470,695 bulbs! Ok just one more and I think you get the idea- year 8= 45,294,865 HOLY ONION RINGS! that’s a pretty good increase and not so long to a field full of onions!
The onions ripened early and were harvested ahead of my other potato onions. That in spite of being planted later than some of the Yellows. Kelly says that the Green Mountain Multiplier comes in ahead of all his others, so they do appear to be early.
So how can you be the first one on your block to possess the promising Green Mountain Multiplier? I’m growing all of mine out for at least another season before I do anything with them, and probably longer. I’d like to concentrate on multiplying them as much as possible for now. I have a feeling they will become more readily available over the next decade or so as numbers increase. In the meantime, you can contact Kelly, but they will probably be in very short supply.
Kelly’s success with the Green Mountain Multiplier is encouraging and seems to point the way for further development. More on that point and on my potato onion seed experiments in some future post!
Update June 28th 2013: This year I planted all of the Green Mountain Multiplier bulbs I had on the Winter Solstice. They were plenty hardy and grew well. Surprisingly, they are already dying down and most are ready to lift and cure in the shade somewhere. That is great news, because it means that I could beat everyone to market with cured bulbing onions! As far as I know, there is no way to get a regular bulb onions cured down that fast in this climate, though I may be wrong, no one does it to my knowledge. The onions did flower a little, but so did some of my yellows planted at the same time though, oddly, not in the same bed. I will probably continue to propagate most of the bulbs, though I may run out of room unless I expand somehow.
Update, September 7th 2013: Just sorted through the Green Mountains. I didn't cure them very carefully this year, but just stuffed them in some baskets in the shed without any trimming, leaves and all (not recommended). I still didn't lose that many to rot, maybe around 20. The total bulbs I have now, not counting rotten ones, the few I've eaten and one I gave to a neighbor to plant, is 390 bulbs. That means that if one is separated from other bulbs in the cluster enough to easily break it off for planting, I count it as a bulb. That's uncannily close to my estimate above of 385 bulbs in the second year, when starting with 8 bulbs. I'm not totally sure how many I planted, but it was probably close to 55. There does appear to be less internal bifurcation (internal dividing of bulbs leaving a papery sheath between) than on the yellow potato onion, but I'll be making a close count of that later. The onions flowered quite a bit actually. A rough count indicates that something less than a third of the harvested bulbs have flower stalks. Also, the flower stalks appear, in many cases, to be coming through the center of the bulb. That could be bad news for keeping ability. I'm thinking that planting time has a big influence on flowering here, so I may wait to plant, at least most of them, until close to spring instead of on the winter solstice as I did this year. Some of my yellow potato onions planted at the same time also flowered, though oddly not the ones planted right next to the GMMs. I haven't done a close taste test yet, but otherwise, the GMM does seem to be superior, or equal, to the yellow potato onion in all other ways. If it has a propensity to flowering that cannot be controlled though, and/or if the bolted onions don't keep, that could be a deal killer. I could try to eat up the bolted onions, but that's a hassle. Most of the bolted ones are not marketable either. I'll need a couple few more years to assess their tendency to (or not to) flower.
Update, August 30th 2014: This year onions planted in the fall or winter (I actually can't remember when I planted them, but either around the winter solstice, or in the fall.) bolted heavily producing large quantities of flower stalks. Onions planted in the spring however produced no significant amount of flower stalks. The Yellow potato onions seem to be similar, but I planted those in both fall and at the solstice and they still only produced a fairly small number of flower stalks (which BTW, failed to self pollinate for the second year in a row). Kelly Winterton says that the seed grown shallots and onions will take years of vegetative propagation before the flowering trait will eventually be suppressed, but I'm not sure what he's basing that claim on. If I can suppress the flowering by simply planting in spring, then that's works for me, though I'm not sure how that will play out in other climates. By way of contrast though, I picked up a variety called copper shallot in trade from an onion grower. It looks quite a lot like a yellow potato onion, but larger with a pink tint to the flesh and copper colored bulbs. It's quite nice and a little larger than the yellow potato onion. I planted that one in the fall and it produced only two weak flower stalks. Almost total lack of flowering is still a primary goal in my breeding efforts. It might be nice to be able to induce flowering for breeding purposes, but for the most part, I don't want to see flower stalks. It may simply be a catch 22 that we want to breed new varieties with increased vigor from seed, but don't want the offspring to produce seed. If spring planting will consistently avoid flowering, maybe that will have to be good enough though, or perhaps Kelly is right and they will eventually cease flowering if propagated vegetatively for long enough. My own potato onion breeding trials are underway now. I planted the first lot of seedlings in the ground late and many did not go dormant in the fall. Those that did go dormant were saved over in storage and spring planted this year and most of those did not flower. Those left in the ground which grew on through the winter flowered prolifically and were all discarded from the trials.
RELATED POSTS: POTATO ONIONS! & A COMPILATION OF POTATO ONION RESEARCH
(The comments in this article have been slightly updated and the title changed since first publishing. The original title was: Some 19th Century References on Biochar Use in Europe and America, which was just sort of lame.)
Biochar, the promising expedient of adding charcoal as a soil amendment, is often represented as a recent discovery of a very ancient technique originating in South America. But, the research I've been doing lately shows that its use probably has more of a history than we may think and may have been gaining momentum among European and American horticulturalists in the 19th century. I will present all of that research here after a short introduction.
As a keen experimenter, super geek and infoholic interested in what are now mostly considered archaic arts, I find myself frequenting online archives of old books to find knowledge on various subjects. The most searchable and useful of these that I know of is the arm of our big brother known as Googlebooks. This is an astounding tool for the type of research I do! Wow! I have collected over the last 2 and a half decades any interesting books I can find on various archaic subjects such as glue making, argiculture, electricity, casein, animal fats, tanning etc... Those few books have been hard won by perusing used book stores, flea markets, junk shops and yard sales, but in the end often amount to little in the way of information when I go to consult them on this or that subject. Sometime a couple of years ago I ran across a reference to something called biochar. I had always wondered if charcoal might be either useful or detrimental when added to soil, so I looked into it a little. I found a collection of enthusiastic experimenters making claims about the greatness of adding specially burned charcoal to the soil. I was intrigued by some of the evidence, but it was all good news, which generally raises red flags for me and I was hesitant to jump in with both feet preferring to wait a bit for more research and more information, both old and new, to become available. The information available on the net has exploded since then. In the meantime, I’ve instructed everyone in the house to pick the charcoal out of the fire in the morning before relighting it and have also salvaged charcoal from campfires and brush burn piles and we have accumulated enough to start experimenting. Researching some other subject last year, I ran across a 19th century reference to putting charcoal in potting soil. Having recently discovered that I could search a gigantic array of books by century, I did a short bit of poking around on the subject of using charcoal as a fertilizer (or fertiliser as the archaic spelling goes) and came up with quite a few interesting looking references. I determined to go back and collect some of them systematically and have now finally done so. I used the search “charcoal fertilizer” and spent many hours systematically sifting through 35 pages of results collecting snippets with references and URLs. Presented below is sort of a reader’s digest version of what I thought were interesting sections. I cut out a huge amount of material and anyone more interested might consult the Long PDF version and possibly also follow the URLs to see if anything else of interest is missing, or to view the broader context of the publication or discussion. Also note that spelling is somewhat dicey. I did a quick correction, but the text recognition software often makes mistakes. If you plan to quote this material, I highly recommend that you consult the original references rather than relying on my selection of material and spelling correction. Having read this material, I’m ready to jump into char with both feet now and hoping to get started post haste. What interests me the most I suppose was the enthusiasm of people with first hand accounts. I feel and hear the same enthusiasm and indeed the same claims from biochar proponents now, only many of these older accounts were borne out of greater personal experience by farmers fit to judge the matter and sometimes over a longer period of time. Another thing that interests me in the material is the repeated claim that everybody was privy to the fact that charcoal has a positive effect on plant growth as well as the claims of its widespread use. These claims may be somewhat exaggerated, but my feeling is that there was a small boom going on which had gained some little momentum. So what happened? That is a question worth asking, but which is not going to delay my haste in beginning to make and use char here at Turkeysong. There was a debate about the action of charcoal and the role of carbonic acid which I’ve mostly deleted. Also, the size of the charcoal that should be used is in debate. I’m leaning toward powdered or at least very fine charcoal, but that remains to be determined. Just how far a rootlet can penetrate a lump of charcoal is beyond my knowledge, but it would seem that smaller particles would give access to a much greater area. There are also, I noticed, many references to burnt clay as a valuable soil amendment. This claim interests me a great deal. For one, it would be possible, and probably easy, to add some clay or soil to a charcoal burn to make use of the heat to vitrify the clay. I plan to look into this concept more and, if it seems promising, experiment along with doing charcoal burns which could produce burned clay and possibly lime at the same time. Some seem to claim that only charcoal burned in a certain way qualifies as biochar, these men were using whatever plain old charcoal they had or could get and, produced by the same slow smoky creosote producing methods that had always been used and are still mostly used the world over today. That to me does not mean that charcoal burned more carefully, cleanly and thoroughly is not better than traditionally produced charcoal, I wouldn't know for sure, but rather that it is clear that regular ol’ charcoal works and that we might accordingly all do well to call this claim into question. I feel at this point that we needn’t worry overly much about the source of our charcoal unless it is from a toxic industrial process which may be contaminated with toxic metals or chemicals. It would seem likely that charcoal made by one or the other method would have more beneficial effects due to a greater total surface area or some other factor, and that we might go out of our way to “do it right” when setting up to burn our own. However, there may be many situations where burning a brush pile in a manner which yields some charcoal might be the better choice over something more inconvenient or too high tech. Intelligent adaptation always wins over dogma. I hope some people find this information useful and inspiring. It is from the 19th century only. I have not followed up any references mentioned and probably will not. I got what I need out of it for now and have other things to do besides sit in front of a computer, such as applying the knowledge I’ve gleaned. It would be interesting however to search in other languages of Europe and Asia. A friend told me that in the sixties he knew loggers in Humboldt county that would burn huge brush piles and then bury the charcoal with their bulldozers to make lush gardens. His claim is that they were after the charcoal specifically. Another friend just told me that charcoal is or was buried in gardens in Japan. Another friend from Guatemala claims that it is used there as well. I’m sure there are interesting references and anecdotes from all over the world if one seeks them out. ________________________________________
Charcoal Dust As A Fertilizer. Charcoal is composed almost entirely of pure carbon; and when small fragments are exposed to the influences of the weather, they undergo very little change during a long term of years. Still the roots of growing plants will lay hold of the small pieces of charcoal, and appropriate the substance contained in the coal to the growth and development of the stems, leaves, and seeds of grain, fruit, and vegetables. Experienced chemists assure us, charcoal, and particularly charcoal dust, has the power of attracting and fixing large quantities of ammonia, a substance which enters largely into the formation of useful plants, and of retaining this fertilizing material when buried in the soil, until the fine fibres of the roots of growing plants require it for promoting their growth. Charcoal has the power of attracting and retaining other gaseous substances besides ammonia, which are highly beneficial to growing wheat plants, as well as grass, vines, trees, and shrubs. Every observing farmer who has been accustomed to raise wheat cannot have failed to notice the luxuriant growth of cereal grain round about the places where charcoal has been burned, even more than thirty or forty years ago. The growing stems of wheat that are produced on such old charcoal-beds are seldom affected with rust; and besides this, the straw is always much stiffer than that which grows where there is not a dressing of charcoal. Before charcoal can promote the growth of plants of any kind, the particles must be thoroughly decomposed, and reduced to a liquid condition. For this reason, previous to the application of charcoal dust as a fertilizer to any kind of soil, the coal should be run through a mill that will reduce the small pieces to fine powder. And even when charcoal is thus finely comminuted by some mechanical means, the action of the fertilizing matter on vegetation will be very slow. .......... R. Ranson, Ashtabula County, Ohio, writes, touching pulverized charcoal, as follows: "I tried another experiment in 1860. My lands are coarse or loose gravel of rather poor quality. I sowed an acre of winter wheat (the blue-stem) preparing my ground as follows: "The field was sown with barley in the spring previous ; yield small (eighteen bushels per acre). I turned in the stubble the last week in August, harrowed it over, then took about eighteen bushels charcoal crushed fine, and top-dressed a strip through the middle of the acre over about one-third of its length; I then sowed on my wheat broadcast and harrowed it over twice. The result was, the heads when ripe were at least twice as long as where no coal was put on. I harvested all together; the yield was forty-three bushels. I think by applying about fifty bushels of coal to the acre as a top-dressing, made fine by grinding in a common bark mill, it would increase the yield at least four hundred per cent., if the soil is poor. "He further states he used burned clay and ashes in the fall of 1860, at the rate of about one hundred bushels of burned clay, taken from a fallow where timber had been uprooted several years by heavy winds. The soil on which the timber grew was burned together with the old roots and clay entwined, and perhaps some muck; the whole, ashes, clay and muck, after being burned as above, were hauled off in a wagon and put upon the wheat field as a top-dressing, and harrowed in with the wheat. The land was poor quality of gravel; the yield was about five hundred per cent. over the remainder of the field where no clay was put. I think there is no fertilizer ahead of this as a top-dresser." See Mixing Soils, second volume of Young Farmer's Manual. ___________________________________________
Charcoal Soot, a chief constituent of which is charcoal, has long been known as a very effective fertilizer; and burning has still longer been known as a mode of reducing stubborn soils to prompt productiveness. But both these sources of fertility might owe their efficiency to other causes than their affording carbon to plants; and it is only within these very few months that anything like a general knowledge has been diffused that mere charcoal is one of the best of manures. The fact has been known for many years to individuals, as, for example, to Mr. Barnes, of Bicton; but it is only very lately that gardeners generally have learned, and I am happy in being able to join my voice to that excellent cultivator’s in announcing, that - charcoal is a most efficient manure to all cultivated plants, especially to those under glass. Heaths, rhododendrons, cucumbers, roses, orchidaceous plants, hydrangeas, camellias, melons, and pine apples, have been the subjects of extended and most successful experiments. The advocates are too well known to require more than naming, for among them are Dr. Lindley, Mr. Barnes, Mr. Maund, Mr. Snow of Swinton Gardens, Mr. Stewart of Stradsett Hall Gardens, and Mr. Rivers. I think no cultivated plant would be unbenefited by having charcoal applied to the soil in which it is rooted. The following communication from Mr. Barnes shows, that carbonized vegetables are a better manure for onions than even bone-dust. “A piece of ground that was cropped with coleworts last autumn, (1843,) was cleared early, and the refuse trenched in during the winter. 95 feet in length and 10 feet in width, was planted with small onions on the 14th of February, which onions had been sown the second week of September in the previous autumn. They were planted in rows one foot apart, and six inches from plant to plant - with the intention of drawing every alternate one for use through the summer - but the whole nine rows did not get entirely thinned. The following is the weight when ripe for storing on the 1st of August. “Five rows grown where 4 lbs. of bone-dust to each row had been sown in a drill drawn 3 inches deep and filled up, and the onions planted over it - producing 420 lbs. weight of onions - each row yielding from 82 to 88 lbs. “The other 4 rows had applied to them of fresh dry charred refuse and ashes, made from the garden rubbish-heap, two common buckets full, weight 14 lbs. They produced 366 lbs. of onions, the rows weighing respectively 99, 89, 95, and 83 lbs. The last row being injured by a row of red cabbage growing near. “Many of the foregoing onions, which were a mixture of the Globe, Deptford, and Reading, measured in circumference from 14 to 16.V inches, and weighed as many ounces. I weighed 12 together, that turned the scale at 12 lb. 9 oz. I can only fancy what a wonderful saving and benefit it would be to the country, to char the refuse of old tan, chips, sawdust, ditch scourings containing sods, weeds, bushes, and refuse. By keeping the surface of the earth well stirred, no crops appear to suffer by drought that are manured by charrings, but continue in the most vigorous health throughout the season, never suffering materially by either drought or moisture”. On spring sown onions and on turnips, Mr. Barnes finds charred or carbonized vegetable refuse equally beneficial. Three rows, each 95 feet long, of the white globe onion, manured with bone-dust, weighed 251 lbs.; whilst three similar rows of the same variety, and grown under precisely similar circumstances, but manured with char-rings, weighed 289 lbs.
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Liebig gives the results of a series of experiments by Lukas on the use of charcoal as a manure, which seem to corroborate his opinion. From the facts which these chemists, however, adduce, it is evident that the beneficial action of charcoal, as a fertilizer, depends upon the presence of other substances besides carbon. Liebig notes (Organic Chem., p. 62) that "plants thrive in powdered charcoal, and may be brought to blossom, and bear fruit, if exposed to the influence of the rain and the atmosphere. Plants do no not, however, attain maturity under ordinary circumstances in charcoal powder when they are moistened with pure distilled water instead of rain or river water. Rain water must, therefore, contain within it one of the essentials of vegetable life; and it has been shown that this is the presence of a compound containing nitrogen; the exclusion of which entirely deprives humus and charcoal of their influence on vegetation. It is ammonia, to whose presence in rain water Professor Liebig thus refers, in whose valuable work (p. 207) the experiments of Lukas will be found. From these we learn that in a division of a low hothouse, in the Botanic Garden at Munich, a bed was set apart for young tropical plants; but instead of being filled with tan, as is usually the case, it was filled with powdered charcoal, the large pieces of charcoal having been previously separated by means of a sieve. The heat was conducted by means of a tube of white iron into a hollow space in this bed, and distributed a gentle warmth, sufficient to have caused tan to enter into a state of fermentation. The plants placed in this bed of charcoal quickly vegetated and acquired a healthy appearance. As always is the case in such beds, the roots of many of the plants penetrated through the holes in the bottom of the pots, and then spread themselves out; but these plants evidently surpassed in vigor and general luxuriance plants grown in the common way; for example, in tan. M. Lukas then gives a list of several of the exotic plants upon which charcoal appears to have produced the most beneficial effects. It appeared also to promote the rapid germination of seeds. He then proceeded to try the effects of charcoal when mixed with vegetable mould, all of which answered very well. "The charcoal," continues M. Lukas, "used in these experiments was the dust-like powder of charcoal from Firs and Pines. It was found to have most effect when allowed to lie during the winter exposed to the action of the air. In order to ascertain the effects of different kinds of charcoal, experiments were also made upon that obtained from the hard woods and peat, and also upon animal charcoal; although I foresaw the probability that none of them could answer so well as that of Pine wood, both on account of its porosity and the ease with which it is decomposed. The action of charcoal consists primarily in its preserving the parts of plants with which it is in contact, whether they be roots, branches, leaves, Ac., unchanged in their vital power for a long space of time, so that the plant obtains time to develop the organs for its further support and propagation. ........In moist charcoal the seeds of the gardener are found to sprout with remarkable quickness and certainty, but after they have sprouted they do not continue to grow well in charcoal alone." - (7. W. Johnson's Modern Agricultural Improvements.) - J., in Cottage Gardener.
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All red flowers are greatly benefited by covering the earth in their pots with about an inch of pulverized charcoal. The colors (both red and violet) are rendered extremely brilliant. Yellow flowers are not affected in any way by charcoal
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Experiments with Charcoal. We have been favored with the following extract from the forthcoming Report of the Survey of Essex County, by W. C. Watson, Esq., which will be read with interest: Enormous masses of dust or debris of the charcoal, accumulate about the iron works of the county, and create incumberances and deformities. It has been annually spread in vast quantities along the highways, constituting an admirable material for roads. An incalculable amount has been cast into the streams. The attention of men of observation and sagacity has been, within a few years, drawn to the use of this ingredient as a fertilizer. Experience has established its exceeding utility. In the midst of the disastrous drouth of last summer, while crossing a field in Moriah, occupied by Mr. Richmond, in pursuit of some Durham cattle I wished to examine, I observed a lot with its surface deeply and singularly blackened. -Upon inspection I found it thickly strewn with pulverized charcoal. The field presented a rich verdure, strongly contrasting with the parched and blighted aspect of the adjacent country. The following detail of this experiment, supplied at my request, attests the value of this material as a fertilizing principle. "The soil is loamy. The charcoal was applied on four acres of dry land, and one acre of moist soil, by top-dressing. The amount used was about one thousand bushels to the acre, spread on so as to make the surface look black, but not to incumber or obstruct vegetation. It was applied in September and October, 1850, at an expense by contract, of forty dollars. It was procured at a furnace, from a mass of pulverised charcoal left as useless, and was drawn one mile and a half. The effect was immediate. The grass freshened, and continued green and luxuriant after the surrounding fields were blackened by the early frosts. Although the last season had been so unfavorable for vegetation, Mr. Richmond realized one-third more than the ordinary yield of hay, and sufficient to repay the whole outlay. He thinks that he cut nearly double the quantity of grass upon this lot, that he did upon any similar meadow on his farm, and that the quantity of the hay is improved." The Hon. J. S. Whallon has made the most decisive and valuable experiments on this subject. His operations were extended through several seasons, and were observed with great intelligence and discrimination. The result amply sustains the conclusions derived from the preceding experiment I may add that a similar application has been made under Mr. Whallon's supervisor upon another tract in Elizabeth town on a soil of lighter texture and with entire success. In this instance the charcoal was applied chiefly to a crop of oats. The action of this substance seems to be effected by its physical combinations and its chemical affinities. It attracts the rays of the sun and unites with the fertilising gasses of the atmosphere; it absorbs moisture, and combines as a new constituent in the formation of the soil. Almost imperishable, it must remain indefinitely, with no exhaustion of its properties, a perpetual invigorating agent in the earth. The succeeding extract from a communication of Mr. Whallon, elucidates his experiments and views on this very important subject: “I began the use of it in the year 1846, and first employed it as a top-dressing on a strong clay soil, which was plowed in the fall of 1845. I spread on about fifteen wagon loads of the dust to the acre, after the wheat had been sowed and harrowed one way. I was surprised to find my crop a heavy one, compared with my neighbor’s, raised on the same kind of land. The wheat was of better quality and yielded four or five bushels extra to the acre. I have since used it on similar land, sometimes mixed with barn-yard manure, and sometimes alone, but always as a top-dressing, usually on land seeded for meadow. ‘ The results were always the most favorable. I find my land, thus seeded, produces more than an average crop of hay and always of the finest quality. “I have also used the dust on loamy and interval land, with the potato crop. During the series of years in which the rot almost ruined the potato crop, I scarcely lost any potatoes from that cause, and supposed it was owing to the coal dust I used. My manner has been to drop the seed and cover it with a small shovel-full of the dust, and then cover with earth. In this way I have used all the coal dust I have been able to save from the coal consumed in a forge of five fires, and which amounts to about 250 loads per year.” In the colder regions of the Adirondacks, charcoal dust has been used with great advantage. The note of Mr. Ralph presents the experiment in tho following language: “As a top-dressing for meadows, charcoal dust and the accumulation of ashes and burnt earth left on old charcoal pit bottoms have been used here with remarkable results, and I judge from the trials which have been made, that this application has added at least one-third to the hay crop, where it has been used. It was remarked during the past very dry season, when vegetation was almost burnt up by the long continued drouth, that those fields which had been dressed with this substance were easily distinguished by the rich green color of their herbage.”
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PEAT CHARCOAL. TO JASPER W. ROGERS, ESQ. TO THE POOR-LAW COMMISSIONERS OF IRELAND. Gentlemen,—In consequence of my being in temporary charge of the Workhouse Infirmary of this Union, I have had the opportunity of seeing your circular of the 16th instant, No. 61,763, 1849; and I beg to state—and I trust that the information will not be considered unacceptable — that your recommendation of the employment of peat charcoal as a deodorizer has been, at my suggestion, anticipated ; and, according to my directions, fully carried into effect, at the workhouse here, since the 3rd of May last, with the most gratifying and satisfactory results. Having been called on that day to attend a meeting of the Board of Health, held at the workhouse, I was at once struck with the intolerable and sickening effluvinm which, arising from the sewers, cesspools, and privies, pervaded every part of the establishment; and which, with the chlorine, which was being evolved in every direction for the purpose of correcting it, formed a compound of villanous smells, which no stomach but one accustomed to it could for a moment tolerate. Your very active and efficient inspector, Captain Hanley, told me that he had done everything that could be thought of, and had spared no expense to try and have the nuisance abated, but that all his exertions were useless. I then begged him to send down and purchase a few loads of peat charcoal, which were selling at the market; and having told the master how to employ it, the suggestion was at once adopted, and though the material was not of the best description, nor “ recently prepared,” in a very few hours the most delicate and practiced nose could not have detected the slightest offensive odour. Since then the master, with very praiseworthy attention, has had a large pit of the charcoal prepared every week, and by its occasional use through the grating of the sewers, and by sprinkling it over the nightsoil in the privies, the workhouse is, as far as entire freedom from every noxious and offensive effluvinm, a model to every other in the kingdom. In every respect the results have been most satisfactory. Instead of paying from five to ten pounds, every half year, for having the privies cleansed; and having itself and the whole surrounding neighbourhood at the same time poisoned for weeks by the intolerable stench ; the establishment has that task now performed by the paupers, without the slightest reluctance on their part;—and the contents of the sewers, cess-pools, and privies are now collected into inodorous and innoxious heaps, or mixed with the other refuse of the workhouse until removed by the contractor; which, before, he absolutely refused doing, but which he now considers the most valuable portion of what he contracted for. But the efforts on the health of the inmates of the workhouse are very far more satisfactory. I find that the numbers registered during the half year ending 25th March last were 353, of these 132 (or one 26 ll-13ths) died during that period. In the half year ending 29th September last, the numbers are respectively 4,262 and 68, or a mortality of one in 62.23-24ths, and of these 68.23 died between the 25th March and 4th of May—a period of little more than five weeks, before the charcoal was employed, while during the last four weeks in which I had the temporary charge of the Infirmary and Fever Hospital but three deaths have occurred; one from Phthisis, one from Variola, and the third, a poor bed-ridden idiot, from Chronic disease of the bowels. Giving the utmost credit to all the officers of the establishment for the extreme cleanliness and order which prevails throughout, the difference in the mortality of the two periods is so striking, and even startling, that I feel I am not assuming too much in attributing it principally to the improved and healthy state in which the atmosphere is maintained. It must also be recollected that the latter was the period during which cholera was so prevalent, and, though some rapidly fatal cases occurred in the town and neighbourhood, not a single one presented itself in the workhouse, where it was most likely and most dreaded to prevail.
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"NEW" FERTILIZER FOR GRAPES. It is interesting to observe how "old things become new," and how old methods and receipts are periodically revived. Many years ago there was a great stir made about the value of the pruning of the grapevine as a fertilizer for vineyards. Those of your readers that have read Liebig's Agricultural Chemistry will remember how emphatic hoe was in advocating the value of such matters. The California Farmer has lately been impressed with the importance of returning to the soil all the prunings and other waste matter; and the American Journal of Horticulture and some other periodicals give their endorsement of the system. That the prunings, finely chopped up and well plowed in, would be of value there is no doubt, although there are some drawbacks which have not been taken into consideration. Thus it has occasionally been suspected that decaying wood is apt to induce disease in the roots of vines if in contact with them. But the great difficulty is the labor involved. In this country of expensive labor we cannot afford to hire men or even boys for the purpose of cutting up our waste prunings. It is not impossible, however, that a very strong and powerful machine like a straw-cutter might be used. One such machine would serve a whole neighborhood and would reduce the cuttings to such a condition that they could easily be plowed under without any difficulty. Still after all it is a serious question whether it would pay. Our impression is that the benefit to be derived from the use of chopped up cuttings has been greatly over-rated. We tried the plan once, selecting out the smaller shoots and cutting them up with a straw cutter, while the larger we cut with a small hatchet. We applied the prunings of ten vines to the roots of five, and then we invested the amount which we thought we ought to have for our labor, in charcoal which we applied to the remaining five. We thought the charcoal produced the best results. Since that time we have disposed of our prunings of all kinds by converting them into charcoal and at the same time burning with them a quantity of heavy clay. The greatest difficulty is to make the heap sufficiently compact to allow it to be covered conveniently. This we accomplish by means of a few stout hooked stakes. After all the rubbish from the fall, winter and spring prunings, has been collected together, we lay a few stout branches or poles on the top. These poles are then pegged down by means of two or three hooked sticks applied to each pole, and in this way the mass is rendered so compact that it is easily covered with sods and similar matter. The heap after being kindled is allowed to smoulder away, more earth being thrown on as the fire progresses. Several days generally elapse before the work is finished, but at the end of that time we find ourselves in possession of several tons of material of the very best kind for fertilizing vines or any kind of fruit trees. It consists of a mixture of ashes, charcoal and burned clay, and our present opinion Is that there are no better fertilizers for fruit trees, and especially grape vines and peach trees, than just these three articles. As for the shoots and leaves which are removed during the summer, the proper place for them is the compost heap. In many parts of the country the cheapest plan no doubt is to go to the woods and make a lot of charcoal or buy the refuse of the charcoal heaps, and in that case of course the easiest way to get rid of the prunings is to burn them. Under any circumstances we are in favor of subjecting most of the prunings of our gardens or orchards to fire. We thus get rid of a great many Insects and their nests. The prunings of the apple, peach and plum trees; of currants, raspberries, blackberries, gooseberries, &c, should all be brought together in one heap and treated as described. The quantity which thus accumulates is astonishing, and still more astonishing is the amouut of clay which it will burn.
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YET MORE OF PEAT CHARCOAL AS A DISINFECTOR AND FERTILIZER. “I then stated what I do now, that the fertilizing power of peat charcoal can scarcely be over-estimated. It acts upon all that the soil produces—I except nothing: and, to use the words of Dr. Lindley, in reply to a correspondent, (although the learned doctor was at first a doubter,) ‘ Use it for your onions, but it is good for every thing.’ (Hear, hear.) My own experiments have proved its value beyond a question, but I shall give you a few particulars of those made by two- gentlemen of large landed property in Ireland, who, immediately after my first publication on the subject, entered into correspondence with me, and closely followed out my “proposition—Henry Newton, Esq., Mount Leaster^ county Carlow, and James Russell, Esq., Danlivey House, county Donegal—and I beg to say that both were strangers to me until my publications came before them. Mr. Russell commenced his experiments in 1846. He tried it with all the usual farm produce except wheat, with uniform success, and as a top-dressing for grass land he had fully borne out all I had stated in that respect; but his trial on a field of four acres with potatoes in 1847, was very remarkable. They were planted in ridges, or, as termed here, ‘lazy beds;’ one-half the field manured with farm-yard manure, the other with peat charcoal only, about a handful thrown on each seed. The result was more than a double crop from the charcoal; and he informed me that he was himself so astonished at the fact, that he requested Lord Donegal to see and vouch it. At my suggestion he planted oats the next year On the whole field without any further manure, and he assured me the increase on that portion manured with charcoal was nearly in the same, ratio as the potatoes. Now, what is the cause? Simply this. The charcoal lay on the land throughout the winter. Every shower of rain that came brought it ammonia and common salt in abundance. This continued for the winter months, and when spring came, every grain was rich in nutriment, while it held moisture besides, to give it to the seed at once, and stimulate it into growth. Mr. Newton was most anxious to tell you these facts himself, but he arrived in London too late for our last meeting. He brought potatoes, of which I will tell you the history. In February last he planted a large field in drills, manured as usual, not then having charcoal; but in. April he got some, and, before the potatoes being earthed, he top-dressed a few yards at the foot of all the drills as far as he had charcoal. He authorizes me to state that the result was not only very nearly a double crop, but that there was not a taint in one of them, while all the rest of the field was more or less diseased. (Hear, hear.) I regret extremely that he was unable to “wait for the present meeting; but he also authorizes me to say he has now a crop of Swede turnips that cannot be exceeded, to use his own expression. Yet they were not sown till June/. No rain came for a month after; all the crops in his neighbourhood failed, and his were only manured with peat charcoal. In short, he has fully proved its value for all plants; like me, he excepts nothing. But I must tell you his reply to my inquiry as to his experience of its value for grass land. He said,1 Nothing can exceed it; and there is little or no labour in using it.’ My friend Fenwick swears by it, and he declares he will write his name on the best grass in the country with black charcoal, and it will be the greenest part of the field in ten days.”
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As a fertilizing application by itself, charcoal can never be injudiciously used, if the supply of the article is abundant. The qualities that make it valuable to manure, render it equally so to soil in cultivation, as a storehouse of the food of vegetation; while its physical properties may be made useful when it can be applied in sufficient quantities. For garden purposes, its special and peculiar effects upon the health of diseased, and the vigour and beauty of all flowers and plants, make it an acquisition much appreciated..... ...We are not, however, without direct experiment upon the subject of charcoal as a manure, beyond that which has been furnished by ancient authority or indirect practice. The American publications give many striking experiments with it. "It is frequently used for Indian corn at planting, also on grass land, and we have generally noticed that its effects were very favourable."—(Albany Cultivator, 1844, p. 142.) In a trial by Mr. Pell, recorded in the same Journal (1844, p. 183), land which had been manured with charcoal powder produced seventy eight and three-fourths bushels of wheat per acre. Some equally striking evidences of the fertilizing power of charcoal are given by Mr. IHepburn, of Jersey Shore, Lycoming County, Pennsylvania. Many precise experiments with vegetable charcoal, and also with other carbonized substances, upon farm crops, have been made during the last few years, to a few only of which we are now able to refer. In an experiment made in 1841, by Mr. Fleming, Barochan, fifty bushels of wood charcoal increased the crop nearly three tons per acre:— In an elaborate experiment with twenty-eight substances, as top-dressings upon the hay crop, in 1842, by Mr. Maclean, of Braidwood, Pennicuik [Trans. High. Agr. Soc., July 1843, p. 30):— Nothing . . . yielded 125 per acre. Carbon . . 8 cwt." 230" Animulizcd carbon 8 cwt." 170" Soot . . 80 bus." 200" Upon a crop of white turnips, carbon was again tested in 1842, with success:— 30 carts of dung per acre . . . yielded 19 4 15 do., and carbon . . .5 cwt. " 21 9 15 do., and sulphate of magnesia 2" "19 10 15 do., and nitrate of soda. . H" "20 5 15 do., and common salt . . •" "25 4 15 do., and sulphate of ammonir. } '• "19 3 15 do., and gypsum . . . 3" "18 15 In this trial, it will be observed that five cwt. of carbon produced two tons, five cwt. of turnips more than an extra fifteen loads of dung, and exceeded all the other dressings except salt. Upon Oats, the crop dressed with carbon, Mr. Maclean states, "made considerable advances over the undressed portions." An experiment with charcoal, by the Earl of Essex, upon turnips and carrots, in 1844, serves to show the striking influence of charcoal pushing on vegetation. In this trial, No. 1, nothing; No. 2, charcoal and salt; and No. 3, charcoal alone, were sown on the 3d of June. The drought being severe, Nob. 2 and 3 vegetated quickly, and grew rapidly, while No. 1 appeared to make no progress. On July 17, the Earl of Essex exhibited a plant from each plot, which plants, he states (Jour. Roy. Agr. Soc., vol. v. p. 280), bore the following proportions to each other:—. "No. 1. Just coming into rough leaf. "No. 2. Eleven inches long, from end of root to the head. "No. 3. Twenty inches long, and as big as my little finger at the crown of the root, and very vigorous." Six acres of carrots were also sown by Lord Essex with charcoal, "the ground at tho time being dusty, and no rain falling for many weeks." Upon which trial he comments—" Carrots, under any circumstances of rain, <kc, seldom come up in less than four or five weeks; mine, in spite of the drought, were up in three weeks, and held their own during the drought." The sources from which charcoal, for farm purposes, may be obtained, and the several processes connected with its preparation, are subjects of agricultural importance. The supply of pure vegetable charcoal, through the ordinary commercial markets, can only be obtained at a price which excludes it from the list of purchased manures. It may, however, in a great majority of cases, be imported or prepared upon the farm, at a price that makes it an acquisition. The districts where timber is in abundance, or where clearings of wood are in progress, abundant supply of waste wood is not unfrequently at hand, and may be prepared very cheaply. Upon our own farms, we have, in a majority of instances, in the branches of useless trees, in the roots and branches of hedges which may be removed, and, failing these, in the loppings of trees and hedges, and other vegetable remains, material enough for the manufacture of a valuable stock of vegetable charcoal. The ordinary process of preparation is as follows:—.... ....."In the spring of last year," he remarks, "I collected a quantity of peat for various purposes, and part of it was charred, or burned. This mixture was applied to land about the beginning of May, to a sandy soil, for a crop of Swedish turnips. The quantity used was at the rate of at least 200 bushels per acre. We tried it against well-made stable manure, in a state like mould, to cut well with the spade, which was applied at the rate of about twenty tons to the acre, and spread into drills. The plants grew well in both cases. We tried to ascertain the amount of produce per acre from each manure, as late as the middle of January 1846; for, from the mildness of the season, the turnips till then appeared to be in a growing state, each plant having had about two square feet to grow upon. The surface was kept flat, and the ground chiefly worked with the Dutch hoe. The weight of bulbs fit for use, manured by the peaty mixture, was upwards of forty tons per acre; while those produced from stable dung weighed only about thirty tons."
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From the Farmer and Mechanic Comparative Merits of Charcoal and Barn-yard Manure as Fertilizers. In the year 1788, my father purchased and removed upon the tract of land in Hanover township, Morris county, N. J. The land, owing to the bad system of cultivation then prevailing, was completely exhausted, and the buildings and fences in a state of dilapidation. The foundation of the barn was buried several feet beneath a pile of manure, the accumulation of years: little or none ever having been removed upon the lands. Even the cellar, beneath the farm-house, was half filled with the dung of sheep and other animals, which had been sheltered in it. The former occupant of the farm had abandoned it on account of its supposed sterility, and taken up the line of march for the Valley of the Miami, along with the first caravan of pioneers who accompanied Judge Symmes. The barn, before referred to, was removed to another situation soon after its foundation was uncovered, by the removal of the manure to the exhausted fields; and its site, owing to the new arrangements of the farm, became the centre of one of its enclosures. During the seventeen years which I afterwards remained upon the farm, the spot could easily be found by the luxuriousness of the grass, or other crops growing thereon; though the abatement in its fertility was evident and rapid. On revisiting the neighbourhood in the autumn of 1817, I carefully examined the corn crops then standing upon the spot, and was unable to discover the slightest difference in the growth or product, upon that and other parts of the field. This was about twenty-eight years after the removal of the barn. Upon the same farm and upon soil every way inferior, were the remains of several pit-bottoms, where charcoal had been burned before the recollection of any person now in the vicinity, and most probably, judging from appearances, between the years 1760-70. These pit-bottoms were always clothed, when in pasture, with a luxuriant covering of grass, and when brought under tillage, with heavy crops of grain. Eleven years ago I pointed out these facts to the present occupant, and his observations since, coincide with my own, previously made; that they retain their fertility, very little impaired, a period probably of about seventy or eighty, certainly not less than sixty-five or seventy years. Here then is an excellent opportunity of observing the comparative value of charcoal and barn-yard manures, as a fertilizer of lands. The former has not, after at least sixty or seventy years exposure, exhausted its powers of production, while the latter lost its influence entirely in twenty-eight years, and most probably in much less time. I have since had many opportunities of’ observing the effects of charcoal left in pitbottoms, upon vegetation, one of which only,. I will relate. The last season, in the northern part of Ohio, was one of uncommon frost and drought . In May, the wheat fields, when promising a luxuriant crop, were cut off by frost;—especially in the valleys, and very much injured in the high lands—which was succeeded by the most severe drought ever experienced in the West. The moiety which escaped both these scourges, was afterwards very much injured by rust. Near the village of Canton, upon a farm on high ground, which had been mostly cleared of its timber by its conversion into charcoal, it was observed that upon the old pit-bottoms, the wheat grew very luxuriantly—was clear of rust—and had ripened plump in the berry; while in the adjacent parts of the field it was short in growth, the stem blackened with rust, and the berry light and shrivelled.. The hint has not been altogether lost upon some of the farmers in the vicinity, and some of them are preparing to make an application of charcoal upon their lands; the result of which, when fully ascertained, I shall be happy to communicate to the public, especially if the facts above stated succeed in attracting the attention of agriculturists. Lewis Vail
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CHARCOAL AS A FERTILIZER. For two years past I have used some fifty loads each season of refuse charcoal, and being fully convinced that it pays, I wish to recommend it to my brother farmers. I have tried it on grass, corn and potatoes—hare tried it alone and in the compost heap, and in all situations it has proved faithful to its trust. As a top dressing for grass, it gives a green color and luxuriant growth.. Applied to half an acre of early potatoes the last summer, the yield was 75 bushels of as fine healthy potatoes as could be desired, that sold readily for one dollar per bushel, and yielded the best profit of anything raised on the farm. The virtue of charcoal mainly consists in its absorbing power. The purity of the air around a charcoal pit has long been known, and the colliers, notwithstanding their smutty appearance, are robust men. The secret of this purity of the air and the health of the colliers, lies in the fact that charcoal absorbs from the air the ammonia and other noxious gasses, unsuited for our lungs, but just the food for plants.— Every good housekeeper knows that if her boiling meat gives forth an unsavory odor, a piece of fresh charcoal put into the pot will not only sweeten the air, but will remedy that taint of the meat. In the same manner it acts when applied to the land. It absorbs from the air those gasses offensive to the nostrils, but the main food of plants. And this it will do, not once only, or for one season, but very possibly for a century. Where an old coal-pit has been burnt, the land never seems to wear out, and the first settlers point to the coal bottoms that are fifty years old, still by their exuberant vegetation marking well the spot where the wood was converted into coal. A fertilizer so lasting is well worth some expense at the outset. But where can we get it? some may ask. If any charcoal pits are burned in your vicinity, the bottoms will furnish three or four loads each of refuse charcoal, mingled with burnt soil. The latter is highly valued also as an absorbent.— Around furnaces and blacksmith shops, the waste charcoal also accumulates, and in many instances may be had for the carting. It may be found also around engine houses, thrown out from locomotiv«s. If none of these resources are at hand, then use the best substitute possible, which is muck, or swamp mud, and double the manure heap by composting, and if the crops are not doubled, then my experience is vain.— Country Gentleman.
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LEAF-MOULD, MUCK, AND CHARCOAL IN VINE BORDERS. BY FOX MEADOW. If Mr. Bright should ask Dr. Lindley for his opinion of the use of charcoal in the soil, (vine borders,) he could refer him to thousands of instances of it as an effective fertilizer, and especially to those plants grown under glass. Heaths, Rhododendrons, Cucumbers, and Melons, Onions, Roses, Orchidaceous plants, Camellias, Hydrangeas, Pineapples, and a host of other plants, have been the subjects of extensive and successful experiments; and we will vouch our word for it, that Dr. Lindley would tell friend Bright that charcoal may, with decided advantage, be applied to almost every known plant in cultivation.
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Apparently, however, much remains to be done before the delicate chemical processes required to obtain many of the valuable chemical products alluded to can be made commercially useful; but the employment of peat charcoal as a manure or fertilizer, as well as a valuable disinfecting agent, is now established, and is extensively used
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Charcoal In Horticulture.—Not only florists but the growers of small fruits in Europe are making use of charcoal for promoting the growth of the plants they cultivate. It is not claimed that the charcoal is in any sense a fertilizer. It is an inert substance, and one not liable to pass into a state of decay even under the most favorable circumstances It endures longer when exposed to the action of the elements than any of the metals, except those that are ranked as precious. When it forms a union with the oxygen of the air it forms nothing but carbonic acid, which, though highly useful to plants, is obtained from the air without the trouble of producing it. It contains considerable potash and some lime, which the roots of plants will appreciate. Its principal use, however, consists in storing up moisture, fertilizing elements contained in water, and various gases, as ammonia, and giving them out as the wants of plants require. A barrel of freshly burned charcoal will absorb nearly its own bulk of soap-suds or liquid manure without presenting the appearance of being wet. The roots of the plants will pass between the pieces of charcoal, and will often penetrate them, and in so doing will be in a position to appropriate the substances in the pores. Charcoal is very desirable for placing in pots or boxes in which house plants are raised. It will retain many of the bad odors that are likely to arise from most fertilizers. It is also very desirable for garden beds, in which roses, annual flowers, and edible vegetables are raised. It is an excellent substance to bury in the ground where grape vines are planted. For placing in pots, boxes, and garden beds, it should be tolerably fine. For grape vines and large shrubs it may be in the form in which it is taken from the kiln, or is usually found in the market. For these purposes it should be buried quite deeply. Persons who sell or use charcoal often have considerable that is too fine for keeping up a fire, and will dispose of it at a nominal price. This will be very suitable for use in the house, or flower, or vegetable garden. Persons who have large graperies will find it to their advantage to burn their own charcoal.
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CHARCOAL AS A FERTILIZER. It will be recollected by our readers, that in our last two volumes we have published several able papers upon the virtues of charcoal as a fertilizer of the soil, and of its supposed efficacy in the preservation of wheat from rust. One of these papers, by Judge Hepburn, particularly points out cases in which lands which had been dressed by charcoal had grown wheat free from rust, when wheat grown on other lands, contiguous, which had not been so treated, had suffered greatly from that cause. We allude to these circumstances now, with a view of introducing the subjoined paragraph to the notice of our readers ; by which it will be seen, that in France the same virtues have been ascribed to charcoal as in our own country. Of the precise mode of action by which this exemption from rust is produced, we are not prepared to speak positively ; but will claim permission to observe, that it may be owing to the very great affinity which charcoal is known to possess for ammonia, and the reluctance with which it gives it out after having once absorbed it. If the opinion which is now gaining strength and consequence, that the cause of rust is plethora, and that ammonia is one of the chief aliments or food of plants, be correct, the preventive properties of the charcoal may arise, first, from its absorption of ammonia as formed, and, secondly, from its yielding it slowly to the wheat plant in the last stage of the maturing of its stem, thus, as it were, hindering it from feeding to that degree of excess productive of repletion, and the consequent disruption of the stem of the plant. At all events, as the rust is one of the most disastrous diseases in its effects, to which the wheat crop is subjected, we think that the use of charcoal to a limited extent, by way of experiment, is worthy of the consideration of every wheat grower. If it should, on trial, fail of the anticipated efficacy, it can do no possible injury either to the grain or to the soil, and may be beneficial to the latter, in supplying it with silicate of potash, a substance of vast importance to all grain crops, and especially useful in giving strength and elasticity to the straw. With these remarks we will direct attention to the following paragraph : Charcoal As A Fertilizer.—We have been astonished at the enormous increase of the wheat crop in France within the last eight or ten years, and have devoted some attention to the investigation of the subject. It appears that charcoal—an article that can be obtained here for a tithe of its cost in France—has been extensively used, and with marked effect, in fertilizing the wheat lands in that kingdom. A correspondent of the New Farmers’ Journal, an English print, states that during a sojourn in one of the central departments of France he learned that some of the most productive farms were originally very sterile; but that for a number of years their proprietors had given them a light dressing of charcoal, which had resulted in a large yield of wheat of excellent quality. Since his return to England he has tried the experiment upon his own lands with the same happy effect. The charcoal should be well pulverized, and sown like lime, after a rain or in a still, damp day. Even in England, the writer says, “the expense is a mere trifle, in comparison with the permanent improvement effected, which on grass is truly wonderful.”— He states one other very important result from its liberal use. “I am quite satisfied that by using charcoal in the way described rust in wheat will be entirely prevented; for I have found in two adjoining fields, one of which was coaled and the other manured with farm-yard dung, the latter was greatly injured by rust, while that growing in the other was perfectly free from it.”—Buffalo Commercial Advertiser.
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[Charcoal renders the soil light and triable, gives It a dark color, and additional warmth for early crops. The bed whereon charcoal has been burnt is always marked by a most vigorous growth of plants when it becomes effectively mixed with earth. It contains also small quantities of salts of potash and other fertilising salts. It absorbs both carbonic acid and ammonia from the air. and yields them to the roots of plants. It is most marked in its effects on plants which require abundant nitrogen. As it is indestructible, its beneficial effects last as long as it remains m the soil, sup. [.King the rootlets of plants with carbonic.acid, which Is renewed as fast as abstracted. Its good effects Begin to be seen when the dust is applied at the rate of forty bushels per acre. Charcoal is invaluable for destroying the odor of decaying animal matter, retaining the gases in its own substance ready to yield them up fur the use of plants. Hence, the best application of this substance is not directly to the soil, but to compost it with putrescent animal matters, urine or night soil, of which it will absorb all the odor and fertilising gases given off during their decomposition. Composted with the last named substance, It becomes Poudrette is second only to guano as a fertilizer.
ln striking cuttings or potting plants, fine charcoal is a valuable substitute for sand, plants rooting in it with great certainty. Plants will flourish in powdered charcoal alone with considerable vigor, and, added to the other materials used in potting, it is found greatly to promote healthy growth in most plants.)
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Charcoal and Some of its Uses. There are various opinions afloat in regard to the value of charcoal as a fertilizer. As an absorbent of ammonia, carbonic acid, &c, it certainly has scarcely a superior. It is also pretty well ascertained, that it readily yields up for the use of the plant, the substances thus absorbed. But there are two features connected with its use which have always commended it to my favor. One is its mechanical effects upon the soil, rendering it more open and friable, and consequently more easily worked, and more open to the action of the atmosphere. The other is the warming effect produced where it is applied in any considerable quantity. A dark soil, we all know, has the power to a greater extent of absorbing heat than a light-colored one. This, in many locations, is a great desideratum. Many plants which it is desirable to grow, but which, for the want of a sufficiently warm soil, is next to impossible, may be cultivated by the use of charcoal. Its carbon yields no food to plants, consequently, even if applied in large quantities, it can do no harm, unless it renders the soil too light and open; not a very likely result. In gardens, therefore, I esteem it highly, and have found it, for the purposes briefly named above, most excellent.—Farmer and Gardener.
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A still better mode, when the quantity and quality of the manure, as in a farm, is an object. is to mix the gypsum with a considerable proportion of either charred peat, burnt clay, or any other substance containing a portion of charcoal; for by this plan the whole of the urine, of at least the shed-fed stock, is not only entirely preserved in the pores of the charcoal from putrefaction, but when carried on to the field it is gradually and steadily emitted, and becomes the food of growing crops. Of the use of charcoal as a fertilizer I shall hereafter have occasion to speak, and for these purposes an impure variety is profitably attainable, either in charred peat or refuse tanners’ bark, or even in the charred matters of clay on moist farms. Whatever doubt there may exist of the value of charcoal, in its tolerably pure state, as a manure, there is I am convinced, from the result of my own trials and observations, none as to its value for the purpose of forming a bed on which the ordinary manure of animals is prepared.
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Charcoal powder acts mechanically in absorbing ammoniacal gas, and also by its color in absorbing the heat of the sun’s rays, and retaining the heat by impeded conduction. When the charcoal is burned only to brownness, then it acts also chemically, being in a condition to form humus, and to undergo oxidation by the action of the atmosphere. Charcoal is undoubtedly a powerful fertilizer, and one of great duration, as is shown by the continued fertility of places where the aboriginal inhabitants of New England built their camp-fires more than two hundred years ago, while nothing peculiar to those spots can be discovered beyond the admixture of large quantities of charcoal and clam-shells with the soil.
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PEAT CHARCOAL THE BEST DEODORIZER. In 1845 we brought before the public the facts which had come to our knowledge of the value of peat charcoal in its natural state as a fertilizer of the soil. It was then doubted, because Liebig and his followers had laid it down that all plants were indebted to the atmosphere for the carbon they contained—in fact, that inhalation gave to the general structure their mass of woody fibre, amounting, when converted into carbon, to from 40 to 50 per cent, of the whole. We doubted this assumption; and since, our doubts have been set at rest; for the Royal Agricultural Society offered a prize for an essay on the subject, and almost every farmer in the country now knows the value of charcoal as a manure, and that which was smiled at then, is not only admitted, but practised now. We feel no small gratification in having been the first to draw general attention in England to this most valuable fact; and we feel the same as regards the extraordinary value of peat charcoal as a deodorizer—but not only a deodorizer, hut the producer of a manure, the value of which we believe there is scarcely any means of estimating.
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Charcoal as a Fertilizer. Mr. Bateham:—Sometime since there was an enquiry in your paper, respecting the use of charcoal as a fertilizer. I have one word to offer on the subject, which is this: some 15 or 20 years since, while owned by another individual, there was much coal burned on my farm while in the act of clearing the land. The land since that time has undergone much tilling, with little or no manure and not much rest until lately; and notwithstanding the time that has elapsed, the places where the coal pits were burned, produce the best of crops of every kind whenever the fields in which they are found are tilled. I am so much pleased with it that I wish my farm was covered I 3 or 4 inches thick with pulverized charcoal. I think the benefits of it could never be exhausted. Respectfully,
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I sowed, on May sixteenth, six seed grains which had been steeped twenty-four hours in urine, and then coated with charcoal dust; and the same number similarly steeped, but not dried with charcoal dust. From the former, on May twenty-first, nine plants had come up; on the twenty-second, thirteen; and, on the twenty-third, two more, making fifteen in all. From the latter there were, on the twenty-first, five plants; on the twenty-second, eight; on the twenty-third, thirteen. It thence follows that the seed kernels treated with charcoal dust produced more and stronger plants than without. That fifteen plants should be produced from six kernels (planted one fourth inch deep) is in consequence of the size of the capsules. A large seed capsule may produce five plants; only a single plant sprouts from a very small one.
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CHARCOAL AS A FERTILIZER. We have all noticed that where a charcoal pit has been burned the soil remains good for a long time. On the mountains of Berkshire we have seen white clover growing luxuriantly on the bed of an old charcoal pit, making an oasis in the desert of ferns and briars that surrounded it, and on inquiry we found that the coal pit must have been burned half a century ago. On digging into this soil we discovered the charcoal with little if any appearance of decay, and promising to do good service for half a century more.
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PEAT CHARCOAL. The use of charcoal as a fertilizer is generally well known. Its expense, however, often precludes its use. To cut down a forest for the sake of the charcoal it would furnish for agriculture would undoubtedly be bad policy. As a substitute, however, for the ordinary wood charcoal, it is certainly important for many to know, that peat charcoal will prove an excellent substitute. In some respects it may be regarded as a superior article to wood charcoal, inasmuch as it will be obtained in a state of fine subdivision, and consequently in a state to operate to the best advantage. Most persons are perfectly familiar with the effects of charcoal upon vegetation. The great desideratum is how to obtain it in quantities, and at a rate to make it an object in husbandry. Surely no one can afford to buy coal, not because there is so much expense in making it, but on account of the value of the materials of which it is formed. Peat however, is a material lying in a waste, useless as it is, and in order to make it valuable, it is only necessary to raise from its half submerged condition, and char it
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Last year we investigated a ease and found, on inquiry at Washington, that the government had given a man a patent on a method of making a “complete fertilizer,” the whole of which was to cover a large heap of pine-needles partly with earth, and then set fire to the pine-needles and burn them, as charcoal is burned. When they had burned all they would, you were told to mix the earth and charred mass together, which was your fertilizer.
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The first day of our trip, we saw the farmers engaged in burning stocks of millet, &c., in heaps of earth, as it is done in the manufacture of charcoal, in order, we supposed, to bring out their fertilizing properties. It a very likely then, that, in China, they have known the value of charcoal as a fertilizer long before us, It’s use for that purpose being among us of a recent date.
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The refuse charcoal, obtained from the rectifiers of spirits, from the Railroads where wood is burned in locomotives, from old charcoal beds, &c., is a very useful material in the garden. As a mulching about fruit trees I consider it very valuable. It keeps out frost in winter: it keeps the soil loose and moist in summer, and it does not afford a harbor for mice or insects. In the soil, it assists to promote moisture in a dry season;........ It is an excellent mulching for Strawberries, in winter or summer.
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ON THE USE OF CHARCOAL AS A FERTILIZER. By Cuthbert W. Johnson, Eso., F.R.S. I Hardly deem it necessary to prove to any one the value of charcoal as a valuable manure; and if it was necessary to obviate the suspicion that there is any difference in the effect produced by the use of charcoal-ashes and the impure variety of these ashes afforded by peat, I am readily supplied with the means of doing so by a recent report by Mr. Peter Mackenzie, of West Plean, near Stirling. He tells us that he has been for some years past trying experiments with peat, charred peat, and peat-ashes, as a substitute for stable manure, and for many kinds of crop grown by farmers and gardeners. He remarks,—“ In the spring of last year, I collected a quantity of peat for various purposes, and part of it was intended to be charred or burned. It was not so well prepared for burning as I wished, a good deal of moisture being in it; however, a good fire was made of wood to begin with, and as the peat dried it was drawn to the fire, and in this way was kept burning for two weeks. It required little watching, only once or twice in twelve hours. The partially dried peat was drawn to the fire, because it was intended to have a quantity of charred peat and ashes mixed together, and in order to obtain both, the fire was kept in a smothered state to char the peat (let the farmer mark the distinction). It commonly burst through in some parts, and there supplied the ashes. When we had a quantity to begin with, the unburnt peat, and the charred, with the ashes, were all well mixed together; at least one-half of the mass was unburnt peat.” This mixture was applied about the beginning of May, to a light sandy soil, for a crop of Swedish turnips. The quantity used was at least at the rate of 200 bushels per acre. “ We tried it,” continues Mr. Mackenzie, “ against well-made stable-manure in a state like mould, cut well with the spade, which was applied at the rate of about 20 tons to the acre, and spread into drills, like the peaty mixture. The plants grew well in both cases. We tried to ascertain the amount of produce per acre from each manure, as late as the middle of January 1846; for, from the mildness of the season, the turnips till then appeared to be in a growing state, each plant having had about two square feet of surface to grow upon. The surface was kept flat, and the ground chiefly worked with the Dutch hoe. The weight of bulbs fit for use manured with the peaty mixture was upwards of 40 tons per acre; while those produced from stable-dung weighed only about 30 tons.
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(on peat charcoal as a fertilizer...) I have previously mentioned the power of charcoal as a fertilizer in hastening the germination of the seed, and on this account alone charred peat may with great advantage be used as a manure for root-crops. Its manner of application maybe broadcast by hand, or with the shovel; this may be better performed by means of a broadcast drill, or by drilling in rows at the same time as the seed by the common manure-drill. For the latter purpose it. is a cheap and excellent substance for mixing with the more expensive artificial manures previous to their application, such as guano, bones, super-phosphate of lime, &c. &c. Ashes are frequently added to artificial manures; but an objection to their being used in a dry state (which by the way is the only state in which they can be applied by the generality of drills) is this: that, should dry weather follow the sowing, the dry ashes, being under the seed, will retard its germination. It is perhaps hardly necessary to mention that the charred peat will require to be sifted before it is drilled. The large pieces that will not pass through the sieve can be pulverised by a rammer, or by drawing a garden-roll over them. The quantity used per acre will of course vary with the circumstance of the crop: when drilled in rows, with or without the addition of other artificial manure, the quantity need not exceed * Mr. Crosskill of Beverley has constructed an excellent implement for sowing manures, which, I believe, has been approved by the Royal Agricultural Society. from 20 to 40 bushels per acre; when drilled broadcast, from 100 to 150 bushels will not be a very expensive dressing. I have never made any very careful experiments with peat charcoal in comparison with other manures; but if we maybe allowed to judge from appearances, the results are evidently satisfactory. As an instance, on July 2, 1845, 40 bushels per acre of peat-charcoal were drilled with green-top Aberdeen turnips on a light sandy loam, the previous crop being rye and vetches mown for soiling. The young plants appeared above ground in a short space of time, and were singled out within a week, as soon as turnips of a quicker growing kind that had been drilled twelve days earlier with 14 cwt. of guano mixed with peat-ashes per acre; this was on the same description of soil, the previous crop being rye fed off with sheep, and the land then manured with 15 cartloads per acre of farm-yard dung; the other, in addition to the peat-charcoal, had been folded. The crops were good, but the cost of the peat-charcoal was barely one-half that of the guano, without taking into consideration the extra dressing of farm-yard manure.* Cirencester, Nov. 28, 1846. * The crop of turnips to which the peat-charcoal was applied in 1845, was fed off late in the spring of 1846; the land ploughed and subsoiled, and on May the 9th drilled with Belgian carrots; the seed being mixed with 2 bushels per acre of powdered wood charcoal: notwithstanding the dry weather the carrots came up well. The produce was about 1200 bushels per acre, and each bushel of carrots weighing 3 stone 3 lbs., will give upwards of 24 tons of roots per acre, exclusive of the tops. The only manure, besides the 2 bushels of charcoal, being the folding of the sheep while feeding the previous crop of turnips.
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ON THE USE OF CHARCOAL. BY COL. M. P. WILDER. I notice in the last number of your valuable periodical the request of Mr. Trimble, soliciting advice as to the advantages of charcoal, and the best method of using it as a manure. I reply with pleasure, but my experience has been on a limited scale, and my operations confined rather to the garden than the farm, on account of the difficulty of procuring it in sufficient quantity for the latter purpose. My attention was first drawn to the influence of charcoal, by the wonderful experiments of Baron Von Liebig, in the propagation of plants, and the facility with which cuttings were rooted in this substance. Its use became very general in Europe by amateurs and cultivators of plants, and for a time it was considered a great fertilizer. Chemists soon, ascertained, however, that its chief virtue consisted in its great porosity, being able to absorb 90 per cent, of its bulk of ammonia. As a medium for storing up the volatile portions of manure and compost heaps, and for absorbing the ammonia which descends in the snow and rain, it has probably no superior. But what renders charcoal still more valuable is its power of holding in reserve those subtle elements, and yielding them up only as they are wanted for the purposes of nutrition, and as the vital force of the root searches for food. It will therefore readily be perceived, that charcoal is not only valuable as a component part of manures, but that its influence, when applied alone, is highly beneficial. Instances similar to those quoted by Mr. Trimble, where large crops had been obtained from lands on which charcoal pits had been burned years' before, are frequently witnessed. In this vicinity a farmer has annually, for the last eight years, harvested extraordinary crops of hay on these charcoal lands, without the application of any manure whatever; and from the indestructibility of this substance, I know no reason why he may not continue to do so for the next twenty years to come. One of the most striking illustrations of its efficacy, when applied alone, that has come to my notice, was the experiment made by Mr. Hayward, of Sandusky, Ohio, many years since, and which, if I am not mistaken, was published either in the last volume of your Farmer's Library, or the first volume of The Plough, the Loom, and the Anvil. The facts I think were substantially as follows: — Mr. H., having prepared his coal by grinding in a mill, set apart seven lots of land for experiments, the soil and cultivation being precisely alike on each, except as it regarded the application of charcoal. The result was, that on the lots where fiftly bushels of coal were applied, there were twenty-five bushels of wheat obtained, while on those lots where there was no coal applied the crop was only five or six bushels. It will be borne in mind that there was no other manure administered to the crop, and that consequently the fertilizing properties must have been imparted by the ammonia which was stored up in the coal. This experiment was very satisfactory, but not more so than many others which we have witnessed, particularly in the application of charcoal to fruit trees, plants, and garden vegetables; and I have yet to see the first instance where charcoal formed a part of the compost, that vegetation did not grow luxuriantly,producing the increasing and quickening effects described by Mr. Trimble. In fact, it is no unusual circumstance to notice the roots of trees and plants either clasping pieces of charcoal, or piercing them through with their fibres. The best method, where any considerable quantity is to be used, would undoubtedly be to grind the charcoal, and I should prefer that one half at least should be as coarse as Indian corn. As to the amount which may be applied to the acre, I think Mr. Hayward’s experience will furnish a good criterion, although I have no doubt a larger quantity than fifty bushels to the acre, for the first dressing, might produce an increase of the crop. If charcoal is to be applied alone, and without manure, the time is not material, except that should be well incorporated with the soil, either by ploughing in, or harrowing, but not deeply. Mr. Trimble describes his soil as being “ generally a strong yellow clay based upon limestone.” Charcoal will no doubt prove valuable on these lands, but more so on light soils which allow the salts of manure to leach through; for clay is also a substance which holds securely the volatile portions of manure, and when made fine by the frost or otherwise, is a capital ingredient for the compost heap,
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When the baskets have been selected, cover the bottom to the depth of two inches with little pieces of charcoal which serve a threefold purpose,—that of fertilizer, purifier and drainage. The dust of charcoal is excellent, beside, to mix with the earth for growing plants.
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Palm culture is not nearly so difficult as most people imagine. Nearly all the finest sorts thrive well in good, fibrous, yellow loam or soil composed of rotted sods, sand and old, well-decayed manure. A sprinkling of charcoal added to this will help to keep the soil fresh and sweet for the tender young rootlets.... ....I like to use broken bits of charcoal for draining all my pots, because when the roots reach down to it they feed upon it greedily, the tiny fibers clinging all about it; and then, too, the charcoal keeps the drainage and bottom soil sweet and healthful for the roots. My experience has been altogether with wood charcoal....
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Charcoal, already well known to be of inestimable value as an absorbent or disinfectant, and likewise containing abundance of nutritious food for growing plants, has also a remarkable influence on the color of flowers. This fact is too well known to gardeners to require much repetition. A few years since, a New-Haven gardener tried the experiment of the use of charcoal on the health of plants in pots in his greenhouse, and said that he could not possibly see the advantage of continuing under the old system without it. " The result of my experience is, that, when not using charcoal in growing roses, they have been more or less subject to mildew, and the roots of the plants more apt to be injured by fungus, whereas with the free use of that material they are not liable at all to be attacked. " And besides, when treated in this way the plants are remarkable for their freshness and beauty; the flowers are so much improved that they seem as though they had been “dipped in colors native well”. We observe that the subject is again being discussed with practical interest in France, and we quote a paragraph from the Revue Horticole, of appropriate effect. “ A correspondent of that journal says that not long ago he made a bargain for a rose-bush of magnificent growth and full of buds. He waited for them to blow, and expected roses worthy of such a noble plant and of the praises bestowed on it by the vender; but when it bloomed, all his hopes were blasted. The flowers were of a faded hue, and he discovered that he had only a middling multiflora, stale colored enough. He therefore resolved to sacrifice it to some experiments which he had in view. His attention had been directed to the effects of charcoal, as stated in some English publications. He then covered the earth in the pot in which it was, about half an inch deep, with pulverized charcoal. Some days after, he was astonished to see those which bloomed of as fine a lively rose-color as he could wish. He determined to repeat the experiment, and therefore, when the rose-bush had done flowering, he took off the charcoal and put fresh earth about the roots, and waited for the next spring impatiently, to see the result of this experiment. When it bloomed, the roses were at first pale and discolored, but, by applying the charcoal as before, they soon assumed their rosy-red color. He then tried the powdered charcoal in large quantities upon petunias, and found that both the white and violet colored flowers were equally sensitive to its action. It always gave great vigor to the red or violet colors of the flowers, and the white petunias become veined with red or violet tints ; the violets became covered with irregular spots of a bluish or almost black tint. Many persons who admired them thought they were choice new varieties. Charcoal has no effect on yellow flowers.”
The Black Trumpet mushroom, also known as Trompette de la Mort and Horn of Plenty, is a delicious winter treat in Coastal Northern California. These relatives of the Chanterelles appear from around December through April up here, but are usually at their best January through March. They will have growth flushes throughout this period. Black Trumpets dry and reconstitute very easily retaining a rich flavor and aroma. Because the dried mushrooms are available to us all year, have become a cornerstone of Turkeysong cuisine.
The mushrooms vary greatly in shape and size. Tidy symmetrical specimens are somewhat rare with the majority being some manifestation of folded, twisted, doubled, twined, lopsided, inside out or otherwise mutant looking. Because they look much like dead leaves or pieces of bark, it takes some experience for one to be able to spot them consistently. The fruiting bodies tend toward gregariousness however, so if one is found there are usually at least a few more very close by and occasionally multiple pounds can be harvested from a patch.
The Black Trumpet is a mycorrhizal mushroom, meaning that it associates with certain species of trees- the mycelium of the mushrooms exchanging nutrients with the tree’s roots. This mushroom, like many other mycorrrhizal mushrooms, prefers to associate with the Tan Oak (Lithocarpus densiflora). We have an abundance of Tan Oak, and we have an abundance of Black Trumpets!
STORING: The fresh mushrooms can be stored for a few days to a week if left unwashed. Cover them with a damp cloth out in the cold weather or put them in the fridge. Do not put them in plastic.
The dried mushrooms will keep well in airtight containers in a cool area.
CLEANING: As the mushrooms are emerging from the ground, they pick up a lot of dirt, leaves, bugs and other crunchy, chewy goodies. We have streamlined the process of removing these unwanted items. Tear the mushrooms in half lengthwise from the top of the funnel to expose the interior surfaces of the . If there are still folds that are closed, tear again lengthwise to expose all interior surfaces. Put the mushrooms in a generous sized bowl with enough water to easily stir and slosh them around. Slosh for 15 seconds or so and then remove the mushrooms from the water. The grit will all sink to the bottom. If this rinsing process is repeated three times, the mushrooms should be 100% grit free. For the less fastidious, two rinsings should be adequate.
DRYING: If you have more fresh mushrooms than you can eat, or you want to stretch your Black Trumpet supply out over the whole year, drying the mushrooms is easy. Wash as above, but spin in a salad spinner to dry. The mushrooms dehydrate quickly above the woodstove, in the sun, or in a power sucking plastic landfill destined piece of dehydrator junk. The dashboard of a car makes a great drying area. They are best placed on a permeable and slatted surface such as a basket. If a cookie sheet or other vapor proof surface must be used as a last option, lay several towels on it first. Try to dry the mushrooms quickly.
RE-CONSTITUTING: The dried mushrooms reconstitute quickly enough to be a good last minute addition to dishes with adequate moisture. If using dried mushrooms on top of pizza or in other drier preparations, you can reconstitute them by brief simmering. Do not waste the cooking water! Only a very small amount of liquid is need and the excess can be cooked down until there is little or no liquid and the flavor is mostly reabsorbed by the mushroom pieces.
EATING
The Black Trumpet mushroom may not look like the most delicious thing ever, but it is very tasty and is a prized element of French gastronomy, which gives it major credibility right out of the basket. The flavor is decidedly savory and somewhat reminiscent of aged cheese. Cooking develops the flavor.
These mushrooms are not only imminently edible, but they are also versatile and can lend their special savoriness to many different ingredients and combinations. In our kitchen, Black Trumpets find their way into an increasingly wide array of preparations. Hardly a day goes by where they aren’t used and most days they are used more than once.
We cook on the fly here and even when we follow recipes, they are usually modified or adapted to the ingredients on hand and in season, so I’m presenting guidelines more than recipes. There are many Black Trumpet recipes online.
Black Trumpets, fresh or reconstituted, are delicious on pizzas and foccacias. The dried mushrooms can also be crushed lightly and added to the the dough or to other savory breads.
Soups, stews and slow cooked moist meats are all good destinations for the Black Trumpet. Wherever it’s salty and savory, the trumpet will often fit reasonably to exceptionally well- Beef stew, chicken soup, slow cooked meats with onion and herbs, miso soup and preparations with meat broth to name a few.
A flavorful sort of sauce or drizzle can be made quickly by simmering a handful of Black Trumpets in a small amount of stock or even plain water and then thickening slightly with Arrowroot powder or Corn starch. Pour this over some grilled or broiled fowl breast, cauliflower or broccoli, or a discreetly sized mound of pasta. A light sprinkling of aged cheese will generally complement well.
When heating oil for a stir fry, scrambled eggs, sauteed onions or other dishes, try crushing a small amount of the dried mushrooms into the oil. This is a great Black Trumpet trick. It is fast and easy and infuses the whole dish with flavor.
Rich, nourishing and flavorful Greek meatball egg and lemon soup is a favorite dish around here. Our version uses Black Trumpets in the meat balls. It is best made with lamb, but goat, beef, venison or pork will all make delicious meatballs. It is preferable that the meat be reasonably high in fat such as one would use to make sausage, at least 15% though closer to 30% would be best. Season the meatballs with adequate salt (use more salt than you would for just meatballs because most of it will end up in the stock. Taste the stock as soon as the meatballs are cooked through and add more salt to taste). Add crushed spearmint and pepper. A small amount of dried oregano and/or thyme is optional. Fresh finely minced parsley is mandatory. We like to add a small amount of minced preserved lemon peel as well. Add a small handful of dry rice grains to the meatball mix. Don’t forget the dried and crushed, or fresh minced Black Trumpets! Add small bite sized meatballs carefully to simmering water and cook gently until done. Turn off the heat and remove the lid so the soup will cool. Mix 2 to 4 egg yolks in a bowl with a few tablespoons of water. Stir the yolks while very slowly drizzling in some of the slightly cooled stock so as not to cook the yolk. Just before serving, add the yolks back to the broth and squeeze in lemon juice to taste.
We’ve discovered that Black Trumpet sausage is excellent! Salt pepper and Black Trumpets, thats it!
I compiled a bunch of references while researching Potato Onions which are posted below. It is also available as a The Historic Potato Onion- A compilation of early references, which also has links. First though, I have some notes on my impressions and observations on reading through these references. Note that there are many different planting dates and methods of cultivation. That is to be expected, I suppose, given the widely varying geographies that the authors are referring to. See also my previous detailed blog post on Potato Onions, for more details about the onions and their culture, which is probably a better place to start your Potato Onion adventure if you are new to them.
Apparently planting smaller Onions makes fewer, but larger Onions than if larger Onions are planted. I believe what is usually being referred to here is as follows. The Potato Onion has a number of “eyes” growing inside of each Onion. I believe each of these “eyes” probably forms a new bulb each of which also has more “eyes”. The larger Onions have more eyes and therefore produce more bulbs when planted although of smaller size due to competition within the plant itself. The smaller Onions having fewer eyes produce fewer Onions but larger ones due to decreased competition for soil resources. There are also however references which say that one small Onion will grow into just one large Onion. I don’t think I have ever seen this happen with the yellow potato Onion variety that I have, so I suspect that it is either incorrect or that there is a variety which does behave this way. It is also possible that I just have not planted small enough sets to observe the one-small-into-one-large phenomenon or, further, that I have observed it and simply forgot. I will be observing the results of growing different sizes of bulbs more closely this year. The idea, as some authors mention, is to grow the right proportion of large and small bulbs to assure larger ones for eating while yet retaining enough small bulbs for good seed. Potato Onions often have internal division where the walls of skin between the “cloves” or main “eyes” have dried off. Some mention is made of dividing them along these lines for planting. I have done so, but not in a very observant manner.
Another interesting recommendation is to plant small Onions on rich ground to grow a crop of large eating Onions while growing a crop of small seed Onions by planting large sets into poor ground. No doubt the size of the seed Onions could be reduced further by crowing as is done is Ghetto rows for growing the common small onion sets that many people buy for growing bulbing Onions.
Some authors point out that the potato Onion rarely if ever goes to seed. I have seen mine go to seed and Kelly Winterton is raising new varieties from seed he has saved from Yellow Potato Onions. It seems that the white variety with smaller bulbs is more likely to go to seed, but it seems less desirable than that Yellow Potato Onion. I also feel that the characteristic of hesitancy to produce seed stalks is a great advantage of the Potato Onion and that new varieties are best selected with the goal of its retention. I feel that there must be ways to induce the Potato Onion to seed when we want variable genetic offspring for breeding purposes If so, such a technique would obviate the need for Potato Onions which produce seed. Kelly’s Onions are quite large, larger than typical Yellow Potato Onions by manyfold, indicating that we should be developing new varieties from seed.
Recommendations for planting Potato Onions run from September through March. with several references referring to planting on the shortest day of the year. Here in my mild climate I have planted in the fall and left the bulbs unprotected through the winter with, as far as I can remember, fine results (though this may be what I did the one year that they ran to seed). I have also planted in late spring and gotten fine enough crops. In colder climates it is recommended to hill the Onions up or plant them deep in a ridge. When they begin to grow the soil is raked down or pulled away to insure that the forming bulbs have light and air. I believe that the authors who recommend that the bulbs be only touching the soil at the base when the Onions in the cluster are forming are advocating the best approach. The Onions are sometimes inclined to rot if from the bottom while still growing or while hardening off. So, I would say that this operation of hoeing away the soil from the bulbs is essential if the bulbs are planted deeply.
Another concern when planting early V.S. late is how long the bulbs will keep. Bulbs of all kinds will only keep so long in storage. I have long followed the strategy of planting them later so that the main crop comes in late and I can keep it over winter well. If I matured them in July how long would they keep? I see from the references that it was more profitable to plant them early to take care of an early market when larger bulbed Onions were not yet ready. That seems to have been a main niche of the Potato Onion and that may be what kept it alive. Its diminutive size was probably a disadvantage in selling, but was made up for by its earliness. I can see the advantage of this strategy and plan to employ it for market gardening and earlier Onions, but I can attest to the advantage of putting out sets later to secure later ripening Onions for storage. The two are not mutually exclusive and if both are followed with some of the early crop used as one does a green Scallion they could fill a lot of the season with Onions, actually year round.
I found the recommendation to harvest some bulbs in the cluster very young for Green Onions interesting. The author claims that the other Onions in the cluster will be the better for it, presumably growing larger as a result of the decreased competition for resources. It appears that they were sometimes grown just for the purpose of marketing early green Onions as well. The white variety appears to grow smaller Onions, but many bulbs and perhaps it is more suited to this purpose??? or rather not as well suited to being a storage/peeling Onion. Another interesting recommendation on these lines is to harvest most of the Onions in the cluster for Green Onions leaving a few to produce more green Onions the following year. This seems an interesting strategy, but I can’t imagine the bulbs simply being left in the ground. I think that the ripened bulbs would be better lifted and stored until planting time. The bulbs when ripe are just sitting on the ground surface. All of the roots rot away leaving the bulb free to roll around or whatever. Still, as a strategy for growing large seed to continue producing Green Onions for market, it sounds intriguing and maybe there is a way that they could simply be left in, or even on, the ground.
Many references refer to the Potato Onion as a poor keeper. That has never been my observation and private correspondence with others has confirmed that it seems to be quite the opposite. I have stored them with no particular care into the summer from a later ripening crop. Last year I planted some from the previous year so late that they were unable to mature and have stood the winter with green leaves. I have also tried to grow a very early crop and then plant out some of the Onions for a second crop the same year, but they would not grow. I’m not convinced that this two crops in one year strategy is impossible to implement, but the Onions may need to be tricked into thinking that growing before being stored a while is just the thing to do. Perhaps the difference in keeping is early crop V.S. later crop, or maybe it is due to the growing of different varieties than the one I have. I do lose a percentage to rot in storage, but I don’t imagine that it is even 5% in the extreme though the percentage increases the longer they are kept.
It is apparent from some of the references that there are some real fans of Potato Onions in terms of its reliability and ease of culture. Several mention resistance to root maggots, a problem which I don’t seem to have here, but then I grow mostly Potato Onions.
There is some mention of a new and superior White Potato Onion. It seems doubtful that this is the White Potato Onion that survives now because it is of a smaller bulb size than the Yellow Potato Onion. Still, it is possible that it was just misrepresented. Most mention is made of the Yellow Potato Onion. While now there seem to be some red ones being sold (I have not acquired any of them) I see no mention of red or purple Potato Onions in these accounts.
I found the account of a Russian vegetable culture very interesting. It refers to the potato onion as something of a staple. It also says that cutting the leaves was said to make the bulbs larger. It seems unlikely that the bulbs would be larger if the greens were cut much. The author says that they are cut like chives, but maybe the bulbs are actually thinned out leaving more space and soil resources for the remaining bulbs to grow larger as is mentioned in another reference.
Taken altogether, it seems that the potato onion could be a very versatile crop serving as early garden produce, summer peeling onions and late storage onions simply by varying harvest times and stages and varying planting times. Add to these things manipulations using cold frames and the like and we see a great potential. The potential is further potentiated by the fact that the onions do not bolt like the often finicky bulb forming seed grown onions.
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This is research material that I compiled on potato onions by searching google books. I thought I would share it to save other interested parties the trouble of repeating the effort. There is a wealth of practical information here. No doubt a repeat search will turn up much additional information in the future as more old books are added to the digital archives. I had to remove the links because they were not behaving in this blog post version, but you can always find the book online by searching a few lines of the text. The PDF version, Potato Onion Research January 2012 should hopefully have intact links.
Steven Edholm, January 2012 http://turkeysong.wordpress.com http://www.paleotechnics.com
googlebooks search for “potato onions”:
_________________________________ The kitchen garden; or, The culture in the open ground of roots, vegetables, herbs, and fruits, by Eugene Sebastian Delamer, 1855 The Potato-Onion differs essentially from the above mentioned varieties, and might almost claim to be considered a separate species. It is of high antiquity, being supposed to be the kind that was worshipped, or held in reverence, by the ancient Egyptians. Not only does it come to maturity earlier than the rest, but it is remarkable for the peculiarity of never producing flowers or seed. So unexceptional is this habit of its growth, that few gardeners, if any, can say they have ever seen a potato-onion in flower. If they think they have, without closely examining the case, they were probably deceived by some stray shallot, that accidentally got mingled with the crop. This variety is therefore propagated only by the root. Very small bulbs increase to large ones; large ones subdivide into a cluster of bulbs of various sizes.
An excellent, and easily remembered garden rule, is, to plant potato-onions on the shortest day in the year, and to take them up on the longest. This early maturity is taken advantage of by the stewards and cooks of vessels that are outward-bound for long voyages, when sailing at the end of June, or the beginning of July. By this means they are well provided with a stock of an almost necessary vegetable. With potato-onions, followed by autumn sown varieties, and those by good keeping spring-sown sorts, a sufficient successional supply of onions may be kept up nearly the whole year round. And, not only is the potato-onion supplemental to the common sorts, in point of time, but also in constitutional resistance to adverse seasons: that is, when other onions,—especially those sown in spring,—fail, either from ungenial weather, the attacks of insects, or defective seed, the potato-onion will produce a heavy crop. On the other hand, it sometimes happens, though much more rarely, that the potato onions do not turn out well in seasons when Spanish, Globe, Blood-red, and even Tripoli onions, are both abundant and of good quality. For potato-onions, give the land a liberal dressing of well-rotted manure during the third week in December; dig it in, preparing the ground well, breaking all the clods, and picking out carefully all the roots of perennial weeds. As near as possible to St. Thomas’s Day (on that day, if you can), after having raked the ground, prepare to plant the bulbs by marking out beds four feet in width, with a foot-wide alley between each bed. Fix your line along the bed, six inches within its outer edge, and along this line set your onions, nine inches apart, on the ground, gently pressing them into the soft earth, just deep enough to keep them upright. Set another row parallel to, and a foot apart from, the former; and then a couple more rows, which will complete the bed. You will thus have four rows, a foot apart from each other, and six inches from the outside edge of the bed. The plants might be, and frequently are, planted at smaller intervals, both from row to row and along the rows; but nothing is gained by crowding the plants or stinting them for room. It may be laid down as a general rule, that all young gardeners plant too thickly. One of the last horticultural maxims learned is, that fine and well-grown specimens are obtained in proportion as they are allowed light, air, and an extended area of ground to feed on. When the bulbs are thus placed in their position on the bed, it will be easy for the gardener, by walking up the side alleys, to draw the earth to the rows of onions from each side, till their crowns are fairly covered. In that state they will be left to stand the winter. If frost has already set in on St. Thomas’s Day, plant your potato-onions as soon afterwards as the weather will allow, remembering always, that the sooner the better. It is a common fault to plant onions too deep; observe, therefore, that the bulb ought not to have more than half its depth below the level of the ground. Supposing it a terrestrial globe, the soil should just come up to its equator. In spring, when the bulbs are firmly rooted, and the leaves from the crown have shot three or four inches, with a hoe take advantage of a dry sunshiny day (that weeds may wither), to draw back the earth which was heaped up against the roots, reducing the soil to its original level, and leaving the bulbs half exposed to the air. Nothing more than occasional hoeings and weedings will be required. If grubs and maggots are apprehended, watering with lime-water will be a useful precaution; but if they have once eaten their way into the bulb, scarcely anything will touch them. At the end of the first fortnight in June, symptoms of ripeness will be visible, in the flagging and withering of the leaves. When the original bulb has divided into a large cluster, the central knot will be ripe several days before those next the ground. It may be removed by simply lifting it out, which will expose those which remain to a greater share of sunshine. Potato-onions, like the seeding sorts, should be well weathered before storing, which,will be sufficiently effected, when they are dry, by hanging them in bunches in any dry airy shed, or even in the open air, under the projecting eaves of a cottage. Monsieur Mauduit, of Quimperle, who has long been a successful grower of this variety, advises, as a mode of preserving them, to cut off the stem about an inch and a half above the neck of the onion, to split the end which remains into four pieces, quite down, but without wounding the bulb itself, and to leave it to dry in this state. It will be seen that directions to earth-up potato-onions during their growth are directly the reverse of what ought to be done. The potato-onion is well flavoured, and is applicable to all the culinary uses for which onions in general are employed.
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The American Farmer By John Turner
September 1866
Potato onions may be set until the 20th of the month. Four to six inches, In rows 18 inches apart, is the proper distance.
Potato onions from small ones, can be grown the quickest of any good variety, and are of excellent quality. The small ones cost from $3.00 to $5.00 per bushel, and should be set 8 inches by 15, and barely covered.
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The Farmer's magazine Rogerson and Tuxford, 1844 POTATO ONIONS. Sir,—I should be glad if any of your correspondents would inform me (through the medium of your excellent journal) what is the cause of the failure in potato onions. In the past year I had a most excellent crop, and they appeared to be well saved; but now, I am sorry to say, they are all rotten. I should be glad to know what dressing is best, whether the same seed should be sown in the same ground year after year, and what time of the year is best to till them. T. C. St. Clement, near Truro. Oct. 8th, 1844. Sir,—I expected that some of our horticultural friends, who are better qualified for the task, would have replied to the queries of your correspondent " T. C." respecting potato onions (Mart Lane Express, Oct. 14). I beg to inform him I had this summer a very good crop, from seed that has not been changed for twenty years. I always plant them in ground manured for the previous crop, as early in the season as it can be got into tolerable working order (they may be set from the shortest day to the end of March), but never two years in succession on the same land. The complaint of their rotting has been general for several years; many persons have discontinued their cultivation on that account; I however, find, by frequently looking over those that are strung, and removing all tainted ones as they infect those touching them, I obtain abundance for the use of my family : the small ones keep best. I have tried, as a substitute, the Strasbourg onion, sown in August, as recommended in a Scotch gardening work, by Walter Nicol, but have not succeeded, as, if sown near the tine he directs, they run to seed in the spring; if later they are injured by frost in winter. I am surprised that no mention of the potato onion is made in the above work, and some others on gardening I possess, as, from their early maturity, when seed onions are scarcely bulbing, there is a very great demand in towns for them.
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Bulletin / Virginia Agricultural Experiment Station, Issues 1-59 1889 As matter of general information, it may be well to mention that all the cultivated onions which form bulbs, belong to the same botanical species, Allium cepa, and that the varieties known as set onions, and the potato onions, have been developed from this species. For commercial growing, the black seed onions have much greater importance than these other forms.
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Bulletin, Issues 15-36: By West Virginia. Dept. of Agriculture 1916
Bunch Onions. For early green onions, onion sets or potato onions should be planted in September or October, in drills twelve to eighteen inches apart in the row. The bulbs, if planted four to six inches deep will require little or no protection during the winter. Sets may be planted in the spring as soon as the ground is in shape, but will not produce as early onions as those planted in the fall, set out two to four inches apart, in rows twelve to eighteen inches apart. Particular attention is called to the adaptability of potato onions to most West Virginia soils and the advantage to be gained in securing early bunch onions.
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Onions for profit:An exposé of modern methods in onion growing (Google eBook) W. A. Burpee, 1893 Potato Onions {Multipliers).—These produce neither seed nor top-sets, but increase by division of the original bulb. They are early, and valuable for market, especially in more southern localities, but do not keep well. Their color is brownish-yellow. According to reports, a pure white variety of superior merit has recently been introduced.
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The profitable culture of vegetables: for market gardeners, small holders ... By Thomas Smith Longmans, Green and co., 1911
Potato Onions.—This Onion, although not much grown now, is mild and sweet, and gives a good crop with a minimum of trouble. It should be planted, just below the surface, early in January, in rich deeply-worked soil, and is ready to take up about the beginning of July; indeed, old cottage gardeners who favour this variety plant on the longest and take up on the shortest day. If the bulbs are kept out of the ground much longer than the end of January they begin to go soft and useless. When very small bulbs are planted they grow into large ones, but large bulbs multiply into numerous others. Plant in rows 12in. apart, 9in. between the setts. As severe frosts will sometimes destroy the bulbs, it is wise to scatter litter along the rows after planting.
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Vegetable culture: a primer for amateurs, cottagers, and allotment-holders By Alexander DeanMacmillan and Co., 1896
Shallots. These are closely allied to Onions, especially the Potato Onion now so seldom grown, yet useful. A cluster one-third natural size is shown in Fig. 13. Small bulblets should be planted early in well prepared soil, in rows 12 inches apart, the bulbs being 8 inches asunder in the rows. From these small bulbs break out numerous others until during the summer quite large clusters are formed, and when ripe are pulled, dried, and stored. They need other
wise simple culture such as being frequently hoed to keep the soil clean. The common Shallot is the smaller, but by far the nicer for flavouring, as it is of a pleasant, delicate nature. The large or Jersey Shallot is reddish and of coarse texture. It is not so highly favoured as is the other variety. It used to be the custom of cottagers in some districts to plant Potato Onions on the shortest day, December 21st, weather permitting, and take them up on the longest, June 21st; but in very early spring planting both of these underground Onions and Shallots answer equally well.
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Fruit recorder and cottage gardener, Volume 2 1870
Potato onions are not grown from seed, but are raised from the bulb multiplying in itself: First, you set out the small onion; this grows till it becomes a large onion the first year. You plant the same onion the next year again, and it produces two or three ordinary sized onions, and, if pure, some ten or twelve small sets around them. These small sets are again planted for large ones, the following year, but those that grow inside should not be planted for seed, for if they are the seed will soon run out.
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Report [of the Commissioner of Agriculture] By North Carolina. Dept. of Agriculture 1905
Sets of Yellow and White Potato onions can be used for the same purpose (editor, referring to the culture of early green bunching onions), and are planted in the same way, but the Queen is far superior for this crop. The Yellow Potato onion sets will make a fine early ripe crop If sold as soon as ripe, in late June, but they must be disposed of early, as they will not keep and are only in demand when the market is bare of ripe onions, before the Northern crop comes in.
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Annual report of the Department of Agriculture for the ..., Volume 19, Part 2 1912 "Multiplier" or "potato" onions are compound bulbs. Instead of having a single heart or core like the ordinary onion, each bulb may have two to half a dozen cores. These bulbels should be separated and planted singly, for if left in the original "potato" they crowd each other in growing like "sets." When given room they make a very rapid growth and are soon ready for pulling to be eaten or sold. But if left in the ground through the season, each bulbel will "multiply" and make a large compound bulb like the one from which it came. Multipliers also send up fruiting stalks but are not so sure to bloom as the other kinds and growers do not desire that they should, so they usually "nip them in the bud," preferring to propagate by the multiplying bulbs.
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Vegetable growing By Jesse George Boyle Lea & Febiger, 1917
The potato onion produces green onions very early in the season. It propagates itself by means of its vegetative parts, by a division of the bulb. Large bulbs of this onion are planted in the spring or autumn, and about the parent bulb is produced a large number of bulblets or small bulbs. The bulblets are planted in the autumn and produce green onions early the next spring. The date of planting is from October first to fifteenth. The small potato onions are planted 3 inches apart in the row, and the rows 15 to 18 inches distant. It is generally desirable to mulch the rows after the ground is frozen to prevent alternate freezing and thawing, which may seriously injure or even kill the seed and cause it to rot. The mulch is removed in spring as soon as growth starts.
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The Encyclopedia of Practical Horticulture: a reference system of commercial horticulture, covering the practical and scientific phases of horticulture, with special reference to fruits and vegetables (Google eBook) The Encyclopedia of horticulture corporation, 1914
Certain types and varieties of onions, including the "top onions" and the "multipliers" or "potato onions," are extremely hardy and may remain in the open ground throughout the winters of our Northern states, especially if given slight protection. These types are, however, not adapted to growing for market, except as green onions, "peelers," or "bunchers," to be sold during the early springtime. In certain sections of the South Atlantic coast region large areas of the top and multiplier onions are grown for this purpose.
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The Cultivator, Volume 2 By New York State Agricultural Society, 1845
POTATO ONIONS. From some remarks upon this species of onion, in the October number of the "Cultivator," it seems that farmers generally are not much acquainted with it. A brief description of its qualities and the mode of cultivating it, may therefore be acceptable to some of your readers. Its mode of propagation is peculiar. A large onion, set in the ground early in spring, breaks into several (5 to 15) separate onions, which grow in a cluster of three or four good sized bulbs at the bottom, and a number of small ones lying on the top. These last vary in size from that of a nutmeg to that of a small hen's egg. The small ones arc the seed for the next year's crop. The smallest will grow into very large, single bulbs; while the larger ones will grow into two or three middling sized onions. The average annual increase, taking Large and small together, is about tenfold. This description will readily suggest the proper mode of cultivation—which is to set out the small onions for the purpose of producing the large ones, for table use— and to set out a sufficient number of large onions for the purpose of producing the small ones for seed. The first should have a moderately rich soil, the last a soil rather barren. The onions should be put into the ground as early in spring as the season will admit. After the ground is made mellow, set the onions in rows far enough apart to allow a hoe to pass between them. They may stand 3 lo 4 inches apart in the rows. Just cover them with earth. They may be stuck into the ground with the thumb and finger. They need no further care, but to be kept free from weeds. To preserve them, they are gathered with a potato hook, as soon as the tops are dried, and then spread for a few days on the barn floor, or some other dry place. I formerly kept them over winter on a scaffolding in my barn; but having lost about 70 bushels by the severe winter of 1834-5,* (thermometer 23° below zero,) I have since put them into my cellar, which happens to be a very dry one, where they keep perfectly well, on a crib with a bottom of laths far enough apart (\ of an inch) lo permit a circulation of air through them. Thus managed they keep longer than any other species of onion. I have them suitable for cooking the year round. In their eating qualities, I do not discover any difference between them and other onions. But for cheapness of cultivation, certainty of crop and amount of produce upon a given space of ground, they surpass all others. There is a sort of Eschalot, that has been cultivated and sold for the potato onion. Wherever this fraud has been practiced it has given the onion a bad name. The genuine article, properly cultivated, has, I believe, been universally approved and highly valued. * A curious fact in physiology came under my notice, the spring following, that deserves to be 'mentioned, though it is foreign to my subject. The rotten onions were thrown out in the spring into the barnyard, where some of them were eaten by hens. This strange food gave our eggs a most unimaginable taste—loathsome and nauseous beyond all description.
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Making horticulture pay: experiences in gardening and fruit growing edited by Maurice Grenville Kains, Orange Judd company, 1909 - 276 pages
"Last November," writes J. G. Orsburn of Kentucky, " I planted 125 acres in potato onions. The land was well manured with chicken and stable manure mixed. It was broken deep and close, and harrowed nicely. The rows were laid off 3^2 feet with a garden plow, and the onions were covered 4 or 5 inches deep to keep them from freezing out of the ground in winter. No more attention was paid to them until the opening of spring, when the ground was dry enough to work. Then I cultivated shallow, and kept it up every ten days, or after every rain, until the onions had matured. The cultivation was done with a garden plow and was never more than 3 inches deep, which left the onions a good, firm seed bed. I harvested them in July, and the plat yielded at the rate of 300 bushels an acre. The onions were as large and fine as any I have ever seen. The soil is designated as Miami silt loam."
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The works of Martin Doyle. [pseud.], Volume 2 By Martin Doyle W. Curry, 1836
POTATO ONIONS Should be planted in December or January, on well manured ground, at ten or twelve inches apart; and from twelve to sixteen inches between the rows. In June or July they may be dug out, and when well dried, hung up to keep. An approved mode of treating these, is, when the leaves are full grown, to draw the earth away from the bulb as far as the fibers, forming a basin round the root; it then throws out fresh bulbs, and they all ripen well. The same method succeeds with Shallots, and prevents them from rotting. ____________________________________________________________________
Circular / Oklahoma Agricultural and Mechanical College and ..., Issues 8-70 1915 Multiplier or Potato onions are commonly used for supplying green onions. These are grown from sets which divide continually, none of the bulbs ever attain much size. The sets are usually planted in the fall in the same manner that spring onions are planted. The following spring each set will produce from six to a dozen green onions. If a few of the onions are left they will remain until the following year and produce again.
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Journal of horticulture, cottage gardener and home farmer, Volume 34 Journal of Horticulture Office, 1878
The Potato Onion grows in clusters, which are divided and planted annually. It may be; planted at the same time as the autumn-sown Onions are transplanted from the seed bed; indeed, we generally follow up these on the same piece of ground with the Potato Onions. The whole crop is lifted in June or July and stored like the other crop. When any are •used the clusters are divided and a few of the best left for planting again. When planted the bulbs are not wholly covered, but about the time they are fully swelled all the soil is removed from round the bulbs, so as to allow them to swell freely and ripen at the same time.
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Dreer's Open-Air Vegetables: A handbook based on recent field observations and talks with gardeners H. A. Dreer, 1897 - 148 pages
Potato Onion. Potato or Multiplier onions increase by division of the bulb. A small bulb planted in spring will produce a large bulb in a comparatively few weeks. A large bulb planted in spring will, by division, produce from six to ten small bulbs. This onion is much planted in the South in autumn for scullions. It is grown in the North as a summer onion, to some extent. Large specimens of it (the yellow variety) were noted in Rhode Island in July, 1896. It is said to be free from attacks of maggot, but is liable to some other troubles. To perpetuate the stock the practice is to plant large onions and small bulbs at the same time.
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The American Home Garden: Being Principles and Rules for the Culture of ... By Alexander Watson (gardener.) Harper & Brothers, 1859 531 pages
POTATO ONIONS. Potato onions are so called from their habit of producing their bulbs just below the surface of the ground. The large roots of these onions are planted, in the same manner as above directed for top onions, to furnish the sets, and these, in turn, produce onions for use. Unless raised with special care, they are apt to be strong and unpleasant. To have them good, it is necessary to divide the sets in the spring until each has but a single heart; then set them out in very rich, light soil, at the ordinary distance for onion sets, four inches apart in rows a foot wide, and cultivate them faithfully by frequent hoeings and top dressing, or the use of liquid manure (see p. 35), and they will yield you fine large onions, of a very mild and agreeable flavor.
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Garden and farm topics By Peter Henderson P. Henderson & Co., 1884 - 244 pages
Potato Onions. These are increased by the bulb, as it grows, splitting into six, eight, or ten sections, which form the crop from which the "set'' or root for next season's planting is obtained. The sets are planted in early spring, in rows one foot apart, the Onions three or four inches between, and, like the Onions raised from sets, are generally sold green, as in that state they are very tender, while in the dry state they are less desirable than the ordinary Onion.
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Market growers journal, Volume 7, 1910 Potato Onions. I planted some small Potato Onion Sets last fall instead of large Onions, and I have all small ones. From five bushels of Sets I have about two dozen large Onions. Some have made as many as a dozen small Onions from a Bet. They made a large growth last fall. Did I plant these too early last fall or have they run out as a neighbor tells met Will they do for planting again this fallf <W. J. B., Virginia. If your Potato Onions are the white variety you will find that they never make very large Onions, but are good for early green Onions. If they are the regular Yellow Potato Onion the growth is probably the fault of the -soil or fertilization, for small Sets should at least make a big Onion and some Sets too. Early planting has nothing to do with it. I always plant the Potato Onion in September to get a strong fall growth. I fertilize in the furrows heavily, and make a bed over the furrow.and set the Sets deeply in the bed, as a winter protection, and in early spring pull the soil away from them so that they will make their bulbs on the surface of the ground; for they should have only their roots in the ground when swelling. Deep planting may have been the cause of your trouble. With heavy fertilization and proper planting and cultivation the Sets will be all right.
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Gleanings in bee culture, Volume 20 A. I. Root Co., 1892
WINTERING OVER POTATO ONIONS. On pages 339 and 340, Mr. A. F. Ames, of Tennessee, speaks of wintering potato onions; and it seems a surprise to you that they, being planted a month later than other varieties, wintered well. Perhaps if friend Ames had planted the others at the same time, they might have wintered as well. I do not know anything about those; but we have grown potato onions for the last 20 years with success, and but very little loss, with the exception of two or three years when we had over two-thirds of a crop. We always calculate to plant about the 10th of October; in a warmer climate I should think better, a little later, so the onion would get well rooted before it freezes up, not putting on your mulch until the ground is well frozen, so you can wheel your manure on with a wheelbarrow. This mulch will then keep the ground from thawing and freezing, which rots the onion. That is how we had our losses. It would freeze a trifle, and then thaw. Perhaps Mr. Ames put on his mulch before the ground was frozen, and they were kept too warm, and smothered. You might get some information on this subject from T. w. (irlner, of La Salle, N. Y., who has tried to winter several kinds. I was there in March. They were coming up then; but how well he succeeded I do not know, as I haven't heard from him. H. F. Gressman. Hamburg, N. Y., May 9. SWAMP MUCK FOR A MULCH. I noticed with interest what was said in May 1st Gleanings in regard to onions wintering when planted in the fall. There are a great many of the potato onions raised here for market. We aim to plant them as late in the fall as the ground can be worked, some as late as Dec. 1. The later they are planted, the better they winter. The best mulch I have found is muck from a marsh near by. It protects the onion perfectly, can be left on. and keeps the ground from getting dry and hard in the spring. Hay or fodder, or straw manure, is apt to rot them. Ada, O., May 11. Jac. Guisingly.
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Onions, and how to raise them By James John Howard Gregory Observer Office, 1865
Potato Onions, or multiplying onions, are a thick, hard fleshed variety, very mild and pleasant to the taste, and very poor keepers, unless spread very thinly in some dry apartment. They are propagated by planting the bulbs in drills, fourteen inches apart, the larger ones four to six inches apart in the row, and the smaller ones two inches. The small ones rapidly increase and make onions from two to three inches in diameter, while the larger ones divide and make from four to a dozen or even sixteen (usually from five to eight) small, irregularly shaped onions. It will be seen that the larger bulbs answer the same purpose as the seed in the common onion; hence to have onions both for sale and yet maintain the stock, it is necessary that both sizes should be planted. The Potato onion should be indulged for its best development in a soil rather moister than the varieties from seed. The advantage of the Potato onion is its earliness, and the fact that it is not as liable to injury from the onion maggot, when that abounds, as the common sorts. I have seen an instance where on half an acre of each growing side by side, the common onion (that raised from seed) was almost wholly destroyed, while the Potato Onion was nearly uninjured. Shallots differ from Potato Onions principally in their characteristic of always multiplying; a shallot never grows into a large round onion; but always multiplies itself, forming bulbs that average more oblong and are usually smaller than those of the Potato onion. 1 find them occasionally pushing a seed shoot, which I have never seen in the Potato Onion. Their habit of growth is finer, making a longer and more slender leaf than the Potato Onion. They are mild of flavor and greatly excel every other variety of the onion family in their keeping properties; with little care they may be kept the year round. All seedsmen do not know the difference between the Potato Onion and the Shallot. Within a few years I have twice had shallots sent me under the name '-Potato Onion." Top Onions are propagated from little bulbs which grow in this variety where the seeds grow in the common sorts. They grow to a large size, are pleasant, mild flavored, rather coarsely and loosely made up, and have the reputation of being poor keepers. Raised like the Potato Onion.
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Annual report of the American Institute, on the subject of agriculture, Volume 5 By American Institute in the City of New York 1847
POTATO ONIONS. On the cjlture of onions in Russia, from the imperial Economical Society of St Petersburg!), by Mons. Sailtet. The weekly Journal of Mussehl, reports the method of cultivating onions adopted in Russia, which consists in cutting the onion into four parts, leaving the quarters united at the root, and the onion having been first hung up and dried in smoke. For want of fresh onions, the smoke dried, still full of sap were quartered down to the roots, and being planted, each produced four fine onions, each of which had its seed stalk. It seems this mode is unknown out of Russia. The onion thus treated is not that from seed, it is the potato-onion. Baron Foelkersahm, a member of the society, thinks it his duty to state, that he has on his estate, followed this method for thirty years, and has constantly had abundant crops.
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Bulletin, Issues 57-88 By North Carolina State College. Agricultural Experiment Station Agricultural Experiment Station, North Carolina State College, 1888
Potato onions should always be planted in the fall in the location in which they are to remain. These are the earliest ripe onions in the market, and can be shipped from North Carolina in June, at a time when the Northern markets are bare of ripe onions, and always bring a good price. But they are bad keepers, as all the dealers know, and there is no sale for them after the Northern onion crop comes in. Therefore they should be shipped as soon as ripe, and only the small sets kept for fall planting.
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British farmer's magazine James Ridgway, 1852
COTTAGE-GARDENING IN CORNWALL.— Onions.—These find a place in, I may say, every garden in this neighbourhood. They seem to be used very much by the cottagers, and many of them pride themselves a good deal on the crops which they raise, in the management of their onion-beds, in preparing the ground, for instance, and the proper time for planting them, and their after-management. In all these respects a great difference prevails here. I have seen but very few, if indeed any, seed onions growing in the gardens of the cottagers in this place. When I enquire of any of them if the onions they grow are seed onions, ' Oh, no, sir," is the reply ; " we never till any seed onions." "What, then?" "Oh, the potato onions. We are always sure of a crop with them." I shall just state some outline of what is practised by a few persons, and this may be taken as a fair index to the rest. In preparing the ground, I have not seen any of the cottagers ridge it, as is generally done by professionals ' up the country'—that is, towards London, from here. They generally bank it. These banks may be from three to five feet wide at the bottom, and all the soil for a foot or two on each side thrown upon this space, making a round-like bank. This is a very common method of winter fallow. Some use this mode of preparation previous to planting their onions. Those who plant them early in winter, of course, cannot allow their ground to derive much good by either ridging or banking of it, Now, as to the digging and planting, all seem anxious to give the ground at this time some good dressing, and dig it over " very nicely." After this is done, they plant their onions in rows, of some four or five In a bed, generally six or seven inches from row to row, and from four to six apart in the rows. Some plant them early in winter; others about the beginning or middle of February, and a few in March. A few days ago I saw a good bed of potato onions all covered over with seaweed to the depth of some four or five inches, and the onion tops six or eight inches above this covering. This Is both as a means of protection in severe weather, and of enriching and manuring the ground; and again, many of these cottagers (especially if they do not keep a pig) are very careful in saving all the soap suds, and whatever else they can in the shape of dirty water, and with this they regularly water, or rather manure, their onion beds. By this means they are often very good and large onions, and arrive at maturity earlier than seed onions sown early in spring. So they can plant broccoli after them (of these they have a variety that grows very large in this county) or flat-pole cabbages: these are almost universally grown by all classes hereabout for common use; others sow turnips—many preferring the Sweed turnip*, or Rodibakers, as they are generally termed here by the cottagers. G. Dawson.
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Journal of horticulture, cottage gardener and country gentlemen, Volume 11 G.W. Johnson, 1866
Potato Onion.—Your correspondent, "G. 8.," in the Number for the 17th inst., wishes to know if any of your readers has, like himself, found their Potato Onions refuse to increase in number. Small bulbs when planted always grow large, and rarely ever split; but good-sized bulbs always divide into from two to seven bulbs, or even more. I often wonder that Potato Onions are not more grown, as by deep culture, with plenty of manure and watering well with weak manure water during the growing season, a heavier crop may be obtained from them than from any other Onion which I hare tried. We always selected our Onions for showing from them, and were generally successful. Their only fault is their not keeping late in the Spring. We always grow James's Longkeeping, or some similar , for late use.—-W. C.
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Gardeners chronicle & new horticulturist Haymarket Publishing, 1897
Besides the vegetables raised and cultivated in hotbed frames, large quantities are grown in the fields. These fields are divided into beds 1.75 meters (about 5 feet 9 inches) wide, the length being indefinite; and the beds are separated by alleys 0.7 meters (27 inches) broad, which are thrown out by the plough, and the earth thus loosened is cast over the beds, so that a bed has a height of 40 to 50 cm. Cart-roads do not exist. In the middle of each bed a row of Brunswick Cabbage is planted, on each side of which a row of plants of the Russian Grape-Cucumber or Gherkin is planted, which is a sort the bine of which does not spread widely. Next to these, on each side, come Red Beets; and lastly, as an edging all round a bed, one row of Potato-Onions is planted. This method of planting is universally followed in the Wilna district. The leaves of the Potato-Onion are constantly cut, just as we do with our Chives, and these leaves form a part of the daily food of the Russian peasantry, who live for weeks on nothing better than black (brown) bread and some finely shred Onion-leaves. In Nischni -Novogorod I obtained fresh caviare served with finely shred Onion-leaves, which, to us Western Europeans, seemed a horrible mixture. The Ogorodniki are of the opinion that by cutting the leaves of the Onion they increase the size of the bulb. However that may be, the Onions taste very nice eaten in the following manner :—First a slice of dry roll, and on the top of this a slice of Onion, above that one of Tomato strewed with caviare. The first plants to become fit for consumption are the Potato-Onions, whose leaves, as I have remarked, are eaten by the folk with much gusto, and not despised even by the well-to-do. The Russian farmer is easily satisfied—a chunk of dry black-bread, and slices cut from a bundle, one and one half inch in diameter, of Onion-leaves, eaten as one consumes a sausage, serves for his mid-day meal. Onion-leaves are eaten in soups and with cold dishes. In order to prevent the Potato-Onion from running to seed, they are, in the winter, exposed to a course of fumigation with wood-smoke for twenty-four hours. The cultivator continues to cut the leaves of the Potato-Onion up to the time when they begin to wither naturally. When the Onion-crop ceases to be productive, the Gherkin fruits begin to mature.
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Intensive farming By Lee Cleveland Corbett Outing Publishing Company, 1913 - 146 pages
.....Market gardeners in the vicinity of every large town and city grow a quantity of early bunch onions, either from sets grown from seed as above described or from another class of onions known as Potato Onions or "Multipliers." Potato Onions are hardier than most varieties grown as sets from seeds. The Potato Onion perpetuates itself chiefly by subdivision of the large bulbs, each large bulb splitting up into a number of smaller ones, each of which is planted out to be harvested for green bunching or allowed to grow to maturity to be used next season to increase the planting stock by again splitting up into several bulbs.
....while Potato Onions are usually planted in the autumn, and in those localities where they need winter protection mulched with straw or coarse litter.
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Gardening for young and old: the cultivation of garden vegetables in the farm garden (Google eBook) Orange Judd Company, 1883
THE POTATO ONION. The cultivation of Potato Onions is similar to that of onion sets. The small potato onions are planted early in spring, in rows fifteen inches apart, and four to five inches distant in the row; keep the land clean, and that is all there is to be done. Each small bulb will make a large one. The next spring set out some of the large bulbs that have been saved for the purpose, and each will give a cluster of small ones to be planted the following year. This is the usual routine, but generally a share of those planted will split up into several small ones instead of making one large onion.
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The American agriculturist, Volume 11 By Orange Judd Publishing Company, Inc. (New York)
pg 4
Potato Onions.—The large potato onion is beginning to attract notice among farmers as well as market gardeners. There are three kinds of potato or hill onions : one small; an old variety known by various names, as tho Bunch Onion, Hill, Cluster, and Multipliers; and a later kind known as the Egg Onion, from its resemblance in form to an egg—all of which are propagated only from bulbs or sets. The two latter sorts are worthless compared with the large "English Potato Onion," when it can be obtained; but the scarcity and high price of the seed has prevented its extensive cultivation. Being very early, and for this reason commanding as good or a better price in June and July as they would the following spring for seed, the stock is kept down to the wants of the market gardeners; hence but few find their way into the market for seed, and the demand, as far as I have known, has never been supplied. They are very easily cultivated, and a sure crop; increase about four or five-fold, that is, five or six bushels for one; and the expense of cultivation is a mere trifle, as the ground may be occupied with various summer crops, with little or no detriment to tho onions or the other crops. My method of cultivation, which has been perfectly satisfactory for three years, is to plant them in the fall, or as early in spring as practicable, in rows about two and a half feet apart, and set them from four to eight inches apart— Rural New Yorker.
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Successful Farming
WHEN TO PLANT POTATO ONIONS Frequently it is difficult to secure and get onion sets planted early enough in the spring to produce fine, tender onions for table use as soon as most folks wish them. All this worry and labor can be avoided by planting onion sets in late autumn. November is a good time for this work The earth is as a rule in excellent condition, and if it is not, it is easier to put 11 in good shape than during the wet early spnng months. Sets of any kind will produce good young onions in early spring, but the best to plant is the variety known as the potato onion. These are quite large, but the smaller ones may be used for autumn planting, and will produce from five to ten young onions the following season. If the soil is good, and a liberal coating of wel rotted manure is used to make the Sol rich and to provide a light mulching, the onions will start to grow quite early. The onions will, if allowed to grow, produce a clump of fine onions suitable for •winter use. Reliable seed houses can supply either the seed or the onions from which a start can be secured of these multiplier or potato onions, and when once secured they will remain with you.—J. T. T.
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American gardening, Volume 11 1890
Sowing.—Onions are propagated as follows: I, seeds; 2, sets; 3, top-sets or top-onions; 4, multipliers or potato-onions; 5, rareripes. The first two methods are the most common and important, though the potato onions are valuable in some sections, especially farther south.
pg 171 Potato onions, or multipliers, are the earliest and hardiest of all onions, and they are the chief sort raised by truck growers in the south for early market. Prepare the ground as for seed onions, making the rows one foot apart and set the bulbs five or six inches apart in the row, setting so deep as to just cover them. Press the soil close to them. When they have started, loosen the soil by using a scuffle hoe. When the tops wilt or fall down, pull and top, leaving one inch of top on.
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The new onion culture: a complete guide in growing onions for profit By Tuisco Greiner, O. Judd Company, 1903 - 114 pages
CHAPTER X Onion Varieties With reference to the methods of propagation, onions may be divided into three classes: (I) Onions produced by division of the bulb; (2) onions produced from top sets or button onions, and (3) onions grown from black seed. The last named may be separated into two subdivisions, namely, American and foreign types. According to Professor Bailey's Annals of Horticulture, about twenty kinds of multipliers, potato onions and sets were offered by American dealers in 1889. The leading variety of the first class (onions produced by division of the bulb) is the Potato onion or Multiplier, shown in Fig 47. This is most largely grown in southern localities. The yellow variety has been in cultivation for many years, while the white sort is of much more recent introduction. The bulbs are thick, compact, tender if eaten soon after pulling, and very mild and sweet in flavor. Fall planting is generally resorted to with this variety, the sets being placed in drills four or five inches deep. As the name "Multiplier" indicates, if a large bulb is planted, division occurs during the season of growth, resulting in the formation of from three to ten or more bulbs from the parent. If sets are planted, they will make single large onions, but not multiply. The plants begin active growth very early in the spring and may be bunched and marketed at a good profit, or may be allowed to mature. In the milder sections of the South the Potato onion will grow during the entire winter. The mature bulbs should be stored in thin layers in a dry apartment to insure their keeping. This variety is rarely, if ever, affected by the onion maggot. From the fact that the small bulbs increase in size and the large ones multiply, it is necessary to plant both sizes in order to secure onions for market and also maintain the stock. Shallots are frequently mistaken for the Potato onion. They differ from it in throwing up an occasional seed shoot and in the bulb always multiplying, which is not true with small Potato onions. The bulbs are more oblong in shape than the Potato onion. Shallots are small, may be kept the year round, and possess a mild, pleasant flavor.
ONION GROWING IN THE SOUTH page 107 The yellow Potato onion is about the earliest ripe onion that can be put on the market, and it generally pays very well, because the market is at that time pretty bare of ripe onions. But the Potato onion must be sold as soon as ripe, for it is a poor keeper. It makes no seed, but produces offsets from the bulbs, which are set in the fall as other sets, a small set making a big onion and a larger one two to three of
marketable size. There is another onion of the same character but white in color, which is used at times for early green onions. This one never grows as large as the yellow Potato onion, but is one of the best keepers, and its white color makes it desirable for the bunching in spring.
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The country gentleman, Volume 25: A journal for the farm, the garden, and the fireside, devoted to improvement in agriculture, horticulture, and rural taste; to elevation in mental, moral, and social character, and the spread of useful knowledge and current news. L. Tucker, 1865
POTATO-ONIONS. crop,) required for seed, and the extra labor of setting! out and cultivation, forbid the cultivation of this j onion as a field crop, unless their superior excellence J would command for them a much higher price than I is obtained for the common onion. "N. E. C." asks for information about these onions. I have grown them for fifteen years. A good garden soil in high condition, is essential to success. Fall plow if you can—work in the spring early. Keep a smooth level surface. Mark in rows 15 inches apart. I In this mark I run a wheel hand plow to deepen it; in this set your onions; if large, 4 to 6 inches apart, and less for the small, say 2 to 4 inches, just covering with earth, and placed so as to be nearly even with the surface. The seed grows in the centre of the large onions—nq,stalk, and the onions producing seed or sets are good as any. I have always used them mainly for green onions for market, and consequently could not tell the yield, but presume 300 to 400 bushels might be grown to tire acre. I clear off what is left in July, and plant celery. A. S. Moss. Fredbnia, N. Y. Eds. Co. Gent.—I notice an inquiry for potato onion seed. The potato onion does not produce seed, but re-produces itself somewhat like the potato— hence the name. You set out a perfect onion in the spring, and as thb top grows the bulb rots and sloughs off, leaving from five to ten small germs, from which the tops spring. These make small onions, the whole weighing but little if any more than the original onion. While in this stage of growth they make a very fine salad onion. Any number of these germs may be plucked from the roots for that purpose, and what remains will be all the better for it. These small onions are set out the second year, just as you would set out top onions, and produce the perfect onion. They grow to a fine size, and are very mild, crisp and tender, having very little of that pungent, tear-producing flavor of the common onion. They are So very mild, that persons fond of that root will eat them, with the addition of a little salt, just as they would a raw turnip or an apple. B. C. Hood.
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How the Farm Pays:
The experiences of forty years of successful farming and gardening by the authors
P. Henderson, 1884
POTATO ONIONS are increased by the bulb as it grows, splitting into six, eight or ten sections, which form the crop from which the "set" or root for next season's planting is obtained. These are planted in early spring, in rows one foot apart, the onions three or four inches between, and like the onions raised from sets, are generally sold green, as in that state they are very tender, while in the dry state they are less desirable than the ordinary onion.
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Farmers' bulletin, Issues 26-50 By United States. Dept. of Agriculture: 1900
Potato Onion (Yellow and White Multiplier).—The potato onion is most largely grown in Southern localities. The yellow variety has been in cultivation for many years, while the white sort is of much more recent introduction. The bulbs are thick, compact, tender if eaten soon after pulling, and very mild and sweet in flavor. Fall planting is generally resorted to with this variety, the sets being placed in drills 4 or 5 inches deep. As The name "Multiplier" indicates, if a large bulb is planted, division occurs during the season of growth, resulting in the formation of from 3 to 10 or more bulbs from the parent. If sets are planted, they will make single large onions, but not multiply. The plants begin active growth very early in the spring, and may be bunched and marketed at a good profit, or may be allowed to mature. In the milder sections of the South the potato onion will grow during the entire winter. The mature bulbs should be stored in thin layers in a dry apartment to insure their keeping. This variety is rarely, if ever, affected by the onion maggot. From the fact that the small bulbs increase in size and the large ones multiply, it is necessary to plant both sizes in order to secure onions for market and also maintain the stock.
____________________________________________________________________ Cyclopedia of American Horticulture:
Wilhelm Miller, Macmillan, 1901
Multipliers are shown in Fig. 1532-3. Instead of containing a single "heart "or core, as in most Onions, it contains two or more. When the Onion is planted, each of these cores or bulbels sends out leaves and grows rapidly for a time; that is, the old or compound bulb separates into its component parts. The growing bulbels may be pulled and eaten at any time. If allowed to remain in the ground, each of these bulbels will make a compound bulb like that from which it came. Sometimes flower-stalks are produced from multiplier or potato Onions. The best results with multipliers are secured when the bulbels are separated on being planted, for each one has room in which to grow. Two or three kinds of multiplier Onions are known, the variation being chiefly in the color of the bulb.
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Fertilize me...
Having fallen in love with a glossy catalogue photo of Young Love, a fresh yet sensuous daffodil, pollinated her stigmas with who knows what combination of mongrel pollen and then carefully collected the 8 resulting seeds from two flowers it was time to wait for fall planting time. I kept Young Love’s seeds, along with the other 60 odd seeds I collected from my sloppy daffodil pollination experiments close at hand. At first I was really excited about the seeds and left them out on the desk drying in small twisty tied bundles of spun row cover material. The material allowed the seeds to dry, but kept them from being scattered. After a while, when the hassle of having them all over my desk outweighed the fetish value of looking at them a lot, I put seeds in a special little catch all basket on the desk where I could still sort of see them. Over time I became excited about or distracted with other things and stopped thinking about my seeds. I only noticed them once in a while when I needed something else out of the basket and was like “oh yeah, awesome!” That seems just as well since I had to wait a few months before planting them. Not to worry, come fall, my excitement was renewed.
In early fall I put the seeds out in the greenhouse. I did a little reading on propagation of daffodil seeds. Over all it seemed that they would grow easily enough, although some of the methods of propagation seemed overly complicated. I opted to plant them about 1 inch deep in flats. I used a technique I sometimes favor for special seeds with is as follows:
*Fill a planting flat about half full with rich flat soil made mostly of sifted compost.
*Follow the flat mix with a 1/2 inch or less layer of sand. (could also be 50/50 sand and peat, but I generally don’t find it necessary to add peat to propagation sand, though it will hold water longer if you do. The seeds can be laid carefully just where you want them on the sand.
*Cover with more sand to the chosen seed planting depth, in my case 1 inch.
This system offers a moist but well drained environment for the seeds with plenty of opportunity for the exchange of air yet with fewer of the moulds, bacteria and critters that are found in the composty flat mix. There is a tradition of planting seeds in sand or sand and peat for germination, but they have to be transplanted out soon after sprouting up because they have no nutrients to thrive on. When the seeds in the stratified flats strike roots, they hit pay dirt very soon and are off to a good start without transplanting. Sown in the flats, labels in place and watered in, there was nothing to do but wait.
At first I was patient. But I had started some wild Camas, wild Diogenes’ Lantern, Naked Ladies’ and Tiger Lily seeds at the same time. When the Camas came up I was stoked! I had been watching them all in anticipation and was starting to wonder if they would all fail to emerge. First just one Camas seedling, then more, then the Diogenes’ Lantern began coming up. Then the Naked Ladies... then finally the Tiger Lilies.... but no Daffodils :( I began to check more frequently. I started to doubt that my methods were adequate and wondered if maybe the seeds had rotted. For all I could know, they lay under the sand bed as hollowed out shells or worse yet, shells full of putrid rotting slime that had once held hidden promise of a long life of surpassing beauty. I reminded my self that daffodils are pretty tough plants in general and that they have probably evolved to tolerate these conditions just like any other plant, if not better. They just take a long time right? Maybe I watered them too much in spite of the well drained conditions I gave them. My faith in simple propagation methods was slipping. I resisted the temptation to dig in and have a look.
Every time I was remotely near the greenhouse I would go in and look. I had seeded some Apples too, so I had two exciting seed projects to anticipate. I scanned the surface of the sand carefully for any green tips that might be poking through. I tried viewing from different angles. I moved any suspicious lumps of sand in the case that there might be a shoot just below pushing the surface up trying to get out. I blew on the surface to remove any lose material that might be obscuring the green tip of a seedling. Then I blew harder wishing I could blow a layer of the sand off, but alas it was too wet, too compacted, it wasn’t budging. I thought about removing a thin layer of sand since small bits of moss has started to grow and lock the particles together... but that might damage the tips of any seedlings that were coming up. I thought about spraying the soil with water to remove a layer of sand, but ditto, and besides then I would be over watering and they might rot. Aaaagghhhhh!! It was like christmas when you’re a kid.
!Apples!
Finally, one day there was a green tip in an auxiliary pot of seeds! It wasn’t one I was excited about, but at least there was hope and they weren’t all dead! Now I checked even more often, sometimes three times a day. Scanning carefully... I’m not sure a day has gone by when I don’t check, but it’s been slow going. After the first one, more came up but they took their time about it. One came up every few days at the best and just one in a row of many seeds. Finally about 6 varieties were up, with no sign of life in the Young Love row. wahhhhh!!!! I was out of ideas to speed up the process so I had to be content to scrutinize the soil surface. It’s amazing how fast they come up when they do. Two nights ago, after having checked already once in the morning, there it was by the ghastly LED light of my headlamp, a tiny speck of green in front of the Young Love tag! I probably uttered some happy noises and wiggled around or something. You’d think I could rest in peace now, but no, I probably looked at them three times yesterday to check for new plants
YAAAy!!!
I know, its ridiculous, But it’s nice to have something to be excited about which holds some promise for the future, even if it might be nothing more than a small population of peachy colored and probably buck toothed and lopsided flowers with unevenly split cups. I’m sort of looking forward to getting over it and just letting them grow on till they are ready for their coming out party. I will no doubt go through this process again in a few years when they approach flowering age, only worse. Spreading apart the leaves to see if there might be a flower bud tip down in the there, just enough to get a good look without breaking any leaves. For now though I will probably check them obsessively for a bit longer until excitement wears thin and enough seedlings are up for me to say that the endeavor was more or less a success, which is not the case now with 10 seedlings up out of 70. (I checked last night, make that 11:) Apparently Daffodil seeds can lie dormant for a year or two, but I’m hoping of course that mine won’t. That could really be a nail biter.
Now for some real waiting! Wow, I mean really, three to five years from seed is a long time. I’m glad I’m old enough that it doesn’t seem like an eternity. But, if I pollinate a few flowers a year and with a small amount of effort, I can have new flower varieties to evaluate every spring. I guess you’ll hear from me again when it’s time to shallowly judge Young Love’s offspring based almost solely on physical beauty. Until then, the narcissus are blooming so it’s about time to start pollinating again- Woohoo!
The earliest narcissus daffodils are already blooming here in February. If you have more than one kind of daffodil variety, why not cross pollinate a few and see what happens? Just snip off a stamen that is releasing powdery grains of pollen and rub it gently on the stigma (the little center thingy) of another variety. Repeat for a couple of days in the late morning. What better to do while drinking your coffee in the morning. If you want to keep track, tie on a tag with the name of the varieties using the convention Girl Plant X Boy Plant. Collect the seeds when the capsules begin to dry and open, but before they open all the way and drop the seeds. Let the seeds dry thoroughly before storing in a dry cool place.
Growing huge leeks is just a big ego trip! So here's how to do it!
1) Select a huge variety: Scratch that. Select a number of huge varieties. Products, you may have noticed, are not always as advertised. So, grow several to find one that preforms. Also, do you want length or girth? Usually you will be trading one for another to some extent.
2) Select a variety that is hardy enough for your climate: Leeks require a long season to grow big. If you have extreme winters, leeks may not survive in open ground, but select a hardy one anyway and you can cover it a bit to keep it alive and growing. (See Eliot Coleman's Four Season Gardening for techniques to keep your garden growing through the winter in cold climates). The short varieties seem to be the hardy winter types. My favorite, Bulgarian Giant, barely survives winters here in the low 20's, but plenty still make it through and I select seeds only from those. Very cold climates will probably dictate growing the stubby flag types unless significant protection is used.
3) Start early and keep 'em movin': Leeks grow slowly, so start your leeks in January, February at the latest. They are also tough and they will survive considerable neglect and crowding. But, if you want big leeks, keep them growing by thinning and transplanting into a new flat once they get big enough to really select out the largest ones.
4) Hand Select the Seedlings: I've planted large, v.s. small starts in separate batches to confirm that indeed selecting large seedlings does make a difference. Whether the effect is one of genetic potential or environmental circumstances is open to question at this point and would require a different and worthwhile experiment. I start by sprinkling the seeds in a pot and sifting 1/2 inch of soil over them. Use good flat mix. Its hard to find good flat mix and better to make your own from some tasty homemade compost.
5! Thin early: I'm ruled by practical concerns like food production, so I plant leeks as close as 6 inches and up to 8 inches apart in every direction (i.e. in a wide bed on a grid pattern in staggered rows as opposed to traditional rows). However, I start thinning the small, stubby and crooked leeks to eat in early summer. If you want the super largest plants ever, you should plant them farther apart in the first place. I'm a fan of equidistant grid spacing in wide beds, so I would probably go with 14 inches apart in every direction. If planting closer as I do, thin early so that the plants are well spaced by late summer.
6) Keep feeding those suckers: Leeks have a hearty appetite. top dress them with blood, fresh manures, compost, seaweed, coffee grounds, or whatever ya got. Liquid fertilizers will go a long way too. If you do any of your own slaughtering, blood mixed with water will please your leeks greatly. Urine mixed with water will rock them into orbit. Any manure teas should also be good. Feed them something at least every month or so. I don't dig my beds, but if you do you would probably want to dig a bunch of stuff into the soil like manure or compost etc... but don't rely on that to get your leeks through their long growing season, keep feeding them...
7) Grow for as long as possible: No matter what you do, leeks take time to get their biggest. In the spring they will bolt, so they can't keep growing forever. The longer you can grow them though the bigger they will get until they decide its time to go to seed in the spring.
8) Save your biggest leeks for seed: Don't eat your biggest leeks! You can transplant them if they are in the way, then let them go to seed which will take most of the rest of the season. Try to save at least six plants just to prevent inbreeding. When the seed heads are pretty dry, pick them and dry them further and put them in a jar in a cool place. If you do this for a number of years you will have a strain that is adapted to your environment and tastes! And hopefully huge!
SEE ALSO: , Leeks: Size does matter!
