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Old 04-07-2003, 04:20 AM
Alexander Pensky
 
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Default mulch alternative suggestions wanted

Salty Thumb wrote:
Alexander Pensky wrote in
:


Keep an eye on the "little onion looking shoots" and let me know how
they're doing in a couple more years. You may change your mind. My
beds covered with landscape fabric became seriously infested with
those onions. You have to dig out the bulbs which are about 5 in.
below the surface. With the fabric, you can't do that.



I took a look outside and there were no signs of the little onion looking
shoots which I had promptly snipped last year. Are they dormant this
time of year? Where do you suppose yours got the energy to keep
spreading?


Yes, they are dormant now. The shoots are mostly gone by mid-May up
here in Ohio, so probably a month or two earlier where you are.

I don't know where they get their energy. Apparently if the shoots
are up for even a few days, it feeds the bulbs enough so that
they don't die and keep trying again, even though the shoots have
been pulled. If I just pull the shoots, they will resprout two or
three times, until the weather gets too hot for them.

When I dig out the bulbs, there are many -- dozens -- but they
are mostly tiny, about 2-3 mm diameter. It's amazing how much
green top can come from such a tiny bulb and roots!

Yours may be a different kind of onion, or maybe they don't
spread so much in the hotter climate. Maybe you won't have
the problems with them that I did.

- Alex