Heritage Sweet White develope apparent flowers but what they produce is bubils, not seed! Mine are just about the same height and appearance excepting for the bubil color and the base of the main stalk.

COHO, you were correct (but with your experience you already knew that). Those 2nd tier flowers that looked like a seed head, now have many very small bubils, same thing is happening with the catawissa's.

Thanks for responding,

Wayne

Wayne,
When you harvest the bubils, and the main stalks are drying, be sure to dig the in ground bulbs. I would recommend that you use those in the kitchen and plant only the bubils. Planted back, the bulbs tend to divide profusely and be somewhat smaller. Very pretty white bulbs.
Enjoy.

"Profusely?" Yeah! Luckily, I marked each row to distinguish between those planted from bulbs and those from bulbils. Right now, one can't tell one from another as they've all developed about the same number of plants. They are also both at the same stage of growth with equal percentage of topset stalks. I do note that it's only those from bulbs which have a few already showing the second tier or pseudo blossom. Already wondering what I am going to do with a million bulbils in a few months!

Even though they are developing the topsets, the plants are still quite good as scallions or chopped green onions. With so many on hand, those are the ones currently coming into the kitchen for cooking and salads or simply eating as is. I could easily see those replacing Catawissa for spring onions at farmers markets.

Martin

Martin, do you know of specific cases of farmers who use catawissa or other topsetters for market? I'm curious, because it seems to be entirely overlooked as an option out here. I've been marketing them to stores here on a small scale, and the problem is that they don't have the super-clean and singular appearance that customers are used to with seed-grown scallions. Consequently either the grower or the retailer has to hand-strip each onion rather than the customer doing it at home, as they should. Yet another example of how indolent the average consumer has become.

As per the Xian, it does tend to send up scapes earlier than any other variety I've grown.

By me, Xian was ready to lift in late June. My earliest other variety was Shvelisi, which is typically ready the 4th of July or later that same week. So, as it turns out, Xian is not only a great tasting garlic, it's an early maturing one to boot.

Indeed, at least two vendors at our local farmers market have had walking onion scallions this spring. For certain, one had Catawissas and was also selling the second-tier bulbils as well. His were only moderately clean with just some of the roots trimmed back. The other was a Hmong lady who didn't know which she had but the size was the same as my Egyptians and Catawissas at the time. Her scallions were cleaned and trimmed and ready to be used on the cutting board.

Martin

Does anyone know a source for purchasing either Egyptians or Catawissas? Or maybe someone here might want to sell some? heidi

Heidi, we won't tell everyone else but I still have a large quantity of Catawissa bulbils which seem to be in good shape yet. However, I never sell them. If I did, they'd be work, not fun!

Martin

I will shortly be harvesting Heritage topsets and have a large crop for trades. Yes, I sell the scallions and "mother bulbs" as "shallots" at farmer's market. I grade the sets for size and plant the largest ones 1" apart in midsummer for fall scallions, thinning to 4" in row for overwintering.

This year I was able to carry topsets in storage and planted them out early spring for spring scallions. They are good size now and selling. The scallions from topsets do carry a persistent remnant of the set at the bottom just above the roots, but a strong jet from a hose nozzle dislodges most of it, I leave the roots on and bunch them with a rubber band.

Some of my customers have remarked that they don't buy imported scallions anymore because of disease risk. I have found these to be the ideal way to produce scallions.

See the trade page soon.