Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Cool Weather Crops Growing Strong Zone 8

This fall I planted Bibb Lettuce aka (Butter Lettuce) I fell in love with this variety after eating it at one of our favorite Vietnamese joints. The texture is soft and the texture is silky and my bunch is doing very well this fall.

Earlier this spring we planted onions and garlic in containers and although they produced text book shoots they really never developed into the onions and garlic we thought they would. Could it be that there was not enough room? Maybe the temperature during the day? I don't know. But one thing is for sure they didn't develop. This fall I planted my Onions and Garlic in the raised beds and they are taking to their environment very well. But I'm a bit worried that green shoots will just be green shoots. I'm keeping my fingers crossed on this one.

3 comments:

Wendy said...

I'm no expert by any means, and living and gardening in Zone 5 is a little different from gardening in Zone 8. However, from my understanding, garlic likes to spend time as a bulb in the "cold" ground. You mentioned that you just replanted it, and that may be how you have some success. Here, I plant garlic in the fall, and harvest in the mid-summer. I usually have a pretty good-sized bulb.

One year, I planted garlic in the late spring, and I had some lovely greenery, but no bulb. I left them to overwinter, and when I harvested them the following summer, they were huge.

ATW said...

Wendy- thanks for the insight. It falls right in line with what happened to me. However, this growing season the shoots seem to be growing much better than they did in the spring and hopefully I have the same results as you did. I love Garlic and sweet onions and would love to eat from the garden. I'll keep the updates coming as they progess.

Bonstergirl said...

You know, you can eat both green onions and green garlic--the shoots just like you get at the store. So if they don't bulb up, you can still at least eat the green leaves.