Onions anyone?

[valmom]

For the first time this year I bought onion sets, as well as garlic, to try in my garden. My problem is- how the heck do you weed around the plants?? I try to pull up the weeds and it disturbs the dirt and the bulb roots to the extent that the poor plants topple over. I re-planted them, but how am I going to take care of them all summer? I have put grass clipping mulch around them (what I had in an emergency), but how do you manage bulbs?

 

[curly_kate]

I think that if you get the weeds early, when their roots aren't too deep, it shouldn't really bother the onions or garlic.

 

[HiDelight]

I plant the onions and garlic in thier own beds and very very close together ..that way I just thin and use the young ones as the nice big ones continue to grow to maturity..this crowding keeps weeds down and lets me harvast constantly ...

I dont know if this is the appropriate way to do this but it has worked for years and years of growning garlic an onions

 

[Hattie the Hen]

Hi

Use an Onion Hoe !

I have a lovely hand-held one I bought in Seattle when I was working there. I bought it from a lovely old Vietmanese lady in an ethnic shop which also sold packets of oriental seeds (I bought a selection of these as well & came back to the UK with a heavy suitcase) In those days you couldn't buy oriental veg seed here. They grew wonderfully for me & now whenever I use the hoe

I think about the helpful old woman.

It is a completely different shape from my long onion hoe & much easier to use as it has a little sharp shield-shaped cutting blade, about 2.5 ins long on a curved shank & it's really easy to use amongst the onions or the garlic.

Try to get hold of one! Hope that helps?

:rose Hattie :rose

 

[digitS']

You have gotten 3 very good answers, Valmom .

I have one of those sharp-pointed hand hoes, probably much like Hattie uses. Johnny's sells the type I have.

I also have an Asian friend who makes a little hand hoe out of a short piece of 2 by 4. He drills a 1" hole thru the board and then uses a saw to cut a handle much like one on a clothes iron, or some of those brushes that work well in cleaning the bathtub . Then he screws a hacksaw blade to the bottom of this handle. Worked well at "ironing" things like chickweed and purslane out of the garden by cutting the weeds below soil surface - slice, slice .

Steve

 

[valmom]

Thank you, all! My onions and garlic thank you! This year is sort of an experiment.

I seriously like that hoe!

 

[Hattie the Hen]

Yes Steve that is very like mine but mine is kind of Handmade ,with a wooden handle --I love it to bits & I think it will outlast me -- Easily...!


:rose Hattie :rose