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[Leslie <cayadopi AT yahoo.com>]

Many nights we are dipping into the upper teens, but only from about 4am to 
7am..... Last year I think we only had about a dozen nights like that, this 
year it seems non-stop.  I drove to town this afternoon to meet a friend, and 
I know when I left there was very little snow on the mountain.  Several hours 
later, after a meeting and grocery shopping, I look at the mountain and was 
shocked.... the mountain was on its way to being full of snow again, so it 
must be snowing today.  Yep, got home and on the news its snowing.

The one good thing about the cold is we get to be blissfully lazy !!!

Got a call from daughter today - she wanted to know what year it snowed in 
Miami when I was in college, because..... they are expecting snow I think she 
said Saturday.... and they were having a radio contest regarding what year it 
was last when it snowed in Miami.  LOL.  I think it was Dec 76, maybe Jan 77.

I'm thinking if I mulch thick and then make a plastic tent, they'll be ok... 
worth a shot.





________________________________
From: "clansgian AT wmconnect.com" <clansgian AT wmconnect.com>
To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
Sent: Thu, January 7, 2010 10:41:30 AM
Subject: Re: [Homestead] onion question




> >Day time temps range from 45-65 here, but overnight has been going 
> before 32 degrees most nights.... figure the would  needs deep mulch and 
> maybe 
> plastic overnight????

I had forgotten that you are in a warmer clime than most of us who are now 
in a deep freeze.

Onions aren't all that cold sensitive.  If your temps are staying above the 
mid 20's at night by all means plant the onion outside.


James</HTML>
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>From cayadopi AT yahoo.com  Thu Jan  7 22:15:57 2010
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Date: Thu, 7 Jan 2010 19:15:49 -0800 (PST)
From: Leslie <cayadopi AT yahoo.com>
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Subject: Re: [Homestead] onion question
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Well, hopefully your underground water will be replenished in time from heavy 
snow melting north of you at some point.  When I was driving home from 
Chicago (which had a lot of snow & ice),,,, it seemed like the whole state 
off Arkansas was under water.  There was a lot of flooding all over the 
place.  I wouldn't have thought of some of the areas as flood areas.  It was 
sure strange.
 
There are many days when I only use 5 gallons of water in the winter.  But 
that is only because it is just me, and I can do things in a way I might not 
do if I were more than one person.  I think it would be hard to find a like 
minded person !
 
Darn !!! I pulled out all the carrots, unless I missed some.  I'll have to 
remember to plants some in a separate area next year.
 
 
 
 
Leslie, thanks for asking. We've had more mist than rain, but enough 
rain back in October to recharge our well enough to shower inside the 
house again. My skin is so thankful! We also installed a low flush 
toilet so we don't have to carry 5 gal 40 lb bucket every time. Since I 
work from home and drink a lot of tea and coffee, you should see my 
biceps from carrying water every couple hours! Not only am I saving the 
planet with the new toilet, I'm saving my BACK! LOL.

We continue to do our laundry in town (it's an event!) and dishes by 
hand in the sulphur water provided by our neighbor's hose (this has 
proven detrimental to my plates, we seem to break or crack something 
every week! I'm planning a mosaic).

Like you, we are pouring over seed catalogs. It's really hard to plan 
not knowing our water situation so we're trying to scale back to just 
the kitchen garden and regular vegetable garden, leaving our pumpkin 
patch, 100 tomatoes, and experimental grain plots across the creek lay 
fallow this year. We are renovating several rooms in our house so this 
will be a good distraction as we wait for rainy days. We just replaced 
all our 80 year old pipes and I am not used to having real water 
pressure, which makes me nervous since I feel like more precious water 
is being wasted!

I think carrots are also biennials, so you will have to leave a couple 
in the ground to get seed. Our soil is so rocky our carrots come out 
looking gnarly-scary and I haven't found time to sieve the soil for a 
better turn out. Since organic carrots are one of the few organics 
locally available I think it's better to grow something I can't get.

Sounds like you have a happy bunny running around!

--Sage


Leslie wrote:
> They were from RH Shumway.  02791A Yellow Sweet Spanish.  I still have a 
> lot of seeds left and will be starting some of them indoors this weekend.  
>
> Some of them I grew in a plastic baby pool filled with dirt & compost.  I 
> planted them too close together I think, and those came out about 1/2 the 
> diameter of the ones I planted in the garden a bit further apart.  
>
> I'm probably having beginners luck........ I'm still eating watermelon that 
> I harvested back in October.  I just put them on a wooden board in the 
> garage in a cool spot.  It probably never gets over 45 these days where 
> they're sitting.  Still eating squash too, which are sitting next to the 
> melons.  I had no idea that I wouldn't have to can or freeze some off this 
> stuff.  Even though the onions were indoors, they've been kept fairly cool 
> also, as I only use enough heat to keep the temps from freezing inside.  
> Guess my nordic heritage is coming thru.... nahhh, it's Bev's fault for 
> posting about the laplanders living without heat in the artic.... in skin 
> tents to boot.  If they could do it, I can too.
>
> The seed catalogs are coming in, and I feel like a kid in a candy shop..... 
> wanting to try planting so many different things.  I did call one of the 
> companies today, and they sent me a list of the seeds that are provided by 
> my personal "ban" list.  
>
> I  have no idea if I even purchased a good variety or a bad one, as I had 
> ordered my seeds before I had even heard of "heirloom" or anything else 
> that is posted here.
>
> I've been able to harvest some seeds from the easy things (curcubits & 
> peppers) for next year.  I'm buying new seed just in case I didn't do 
> something right, as a backup plan.
>
> I need to figure out where to harvest seeds from some things... like 
> carrots.  I never noticed any seeds on the plants.  
>
>
> I have potatoes with eyes on them sprouting too.  I hope they hang in there 
> until it is time to plant in the spring.  I haven't been eating them on 
> purpose for seed.
>
>
> I do hope it warms up a bit this weekend so I can do some cleanup and prep 
> work in the gardens.  It's been colder than it was last year that is for 
> sure.
>
> Are you getting rain/snow your way this winter?  I've been wondering if 
> you're getting enough to help recharge your well.  We had 4-5" here not too 
> long ago.  The soil just under the surface is still wet from when it 
> melted.  I couldn't believe the broccoli was still growing afterwards,,,,, 
> except I forgot to close the garden gate, and the rabbits..... well they 
> got a nice green new years present.
>
>
>
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: Sage Austin | Eureka! Design <eureka AT hctc.net>
> To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
> Sent: Wed, January 6, 2010 11:28:38 PM
> Subject: Re: [Homestead] onion question
>
> Leslie, onions are considered biennial, so they would need to be in the 
> ground two years to set seed. If you are down into the teens like us, 
> this wouldn't be a good time to replant your sprouting onion...I'd wait 
> until the coldsnap passes if they have been kept inside at a warmer temp.
>
> If you got an onion to keep for 6 months that's pretty good IMO for your 
> location. What variety of onions did you grow? Since we are in the 
> short-day area our onions are full of sugar and don't keep longer than 
> 2-3 months. I have to dehydrate quite a few.
>
> --Sage
>
>
>
> Leslie wrote:
>  
>> I had a successful onion crop last year.  I cut up some of the onions and 
>> froze them in freezer bags during the summer, used many, and stored the 
>> rest dry in typical onion type bags from the grocer.  I harvested the bulk 
>> of them at the end of July (about 3" to 4" in diameter), dried them, cut 
>> off the greens, etc. and then put half of them in a dark area that gets 
>> air, and the other half in partial low light with air.  Most of the time 
>> stored the temps have ranged from 70-40 degrees.
>>
>> It is 6 months after harvest, and I have noted that some have started to 
>> go bad, others are shooting out new roots and new growth.
>>
>> I've chopped up and salvaged all but two onions.
>>
>> The remaining two  - subject of this query -  have new white root shoots, 
>> and about 3" or so of greens shoots coming out the top.  
>>
>> Should I just eat them, or can I plant them?
>> Will they grow into onions this year and give me seeds???  (None of them 
>> seeded last year, these were grown from seed,)
>>
>> Overnight temps are down in the low 20s to teens, and I have straw mulch 
>> if that helps.
>>
>> I would lilke to attempt to harvest onion seed this year.  Last year I 
>> didn't get any flowers.
>>
>>
>>      
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>>  
>>    
>
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>      
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>  

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________________________________

From: Sage Austin | Eureka! Design <eureka AT hctc.net>
To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
Sent: Thu, January 7, 2010 10:56:33 AM
Subject: Re: [Homestead] onion question




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Subject: Re: [Homestead] onion question
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Nope, I'm too far south and west for any snow melt. We are high in the
hills at the headwaters of three of Texas' rivers. If it doesn't fall
here to begin with we aren't going to see it.

I think you were mentioning in an earlier post some of what you planted
was hybrid seed (not open-pollinated heirloom), so I thought I'd point
out that if you save seed from these plants what you will get when you
grow them out won't be true to the original plant, but a mix of that
plant's crossed heritage. If you are going to become a seed saver, which
it sounds like you already have a great interest, you might consider
buying heirloom seed in the future.

--Sage

Leslie wrote:
> Well, hopefully your underground water will be replenished in time from 
> heavy snow melting north of you at some point.  When I was driving home 
> from Chicago (which had a lot of snow & ice),,,, it seemed like the whole 
> state off Arkansas was under water.  There was a lot of flooding all over 
> the place.  I wouldn't have thought of some of the areas as flood areas.  
> It was sure strange.
>
> There are many days when I only use 5 gallons of water in the winter.  But 
> that is only because it is just me, and I can do things in a way I might 
> not do if I were more than one person.  I think it would be hard to find a 
> like minded person !
>
> Darn !!! I pulled out all the carrots, unless I missed some.  I'll have to 
> remember to plants some in a separate area next year.