Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

market-farming - Re: [Market-farming] Shallots

market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Market Farming

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: road's end farm <organic101 AT linkny.com>
  • To: Market Farming <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Market-farming] Shallots
  • Date: Mon, 26 Jun 2006 19:05:20 -0400


On Jun 26, 2006, at 8:02 AM, logrock wrote:

So Rivka, how do you grow those excellent shallots?


Well, to start with I was given some by a friend who lives in the area. The sets she gave me were tiny; I've been working with them for some years (ten? fifteen? don't remember) and they come a nice size now. You may need a strain that does well in your climate and soil.

In this climate, I spring plant them; I tried them both spring and fall planted for the first few years, but the spring planted ones always did at least as well and most years better; some years winter survival was poor (winter lows here generally in the single digits below zero, sometimes in the teens below zero FÂș ; snow cover erratic; straw mulch.) If you're someplace warmer, I'd fall plant them, whenever garlic gets planted in your area; if colder, definitely spring plant. Sets go in whenever in April I can get on the field (they don't mind some frost), 6" spacing in row, rows spaced 36" so I can get the Troybuilt through the rows easily to cultivate; handweed once or twice depending on weed pressure; harvest generally in August, save some of the nicest and largest for the next year's seed. Get/keep the organic matter up in the field if possible; I like to put alliums after strawberries in the rotation as that puts them after two years of straw mulch applications. If I can manage it, a round of buckwheat between the strawberries and the fall plant garlic is nice. Fertilizer/soil amendments go on this field the fall before planting, according to soil test; usually rock phosphate and/or Fertrell 4-2-4; but your soil needs may vary. If there was a lot of N in the previous crop, and rock phosphate in a previous rotation, they sometimes don't need much. If they look pale in the spring they get some fish emulsion/seaweed mix as a foliar feed; some years they don't need this. Most years here I don't irrigate, some years they get drip irrigation.

-- Rivka; Finger Lakes NY, Zone 5 mostly
Fresh-market organic produce, small scale



Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page