planted onions and garlic on the 15 Oct. last year- fertilized with 5-10-10 - mulched onions and garlic with 6"of leaves directly out of bagger- did two 30' rows of garlic and two 30' rows of stuttgard onions the same way-excellent results this year- left mulch on this growing season- super onions and garlic. same time planted two rows of stuttgarders with leaves and removed most of leaves in the spring- didn't have enough days in the week to keep up with the weeding- couldn't buy any onions this fall to plant- next spring going to plant onions and mulch with straw or wood shavings - don't recommend using to much organic composted chicken manure- it's high in nitrogen- look for composted manure with higher phos. and potash (N-P-K)-goodluck this coming spring- the key is to buy quality sets right in the begining-HAPPY GARDENING!!!

It might happen if the wild onions have already flowered and set seed. Otherwise, no, it shouldn't be a problem. We have wild onions in some of our pastures and when I mow them in spring, I add those clippings (before the onions flower) to my garden mulch and I don't have a problem with wild onions popping up in the garden.

Shaer, If you go to the Dixondale Farms website page I've linked at the bottom of the page, you can read about their trench method of fertilizing. I usually work fertilizer into the soil before planting because I want it down deeper in the bed below the root zone of the early plants, but I also use their trench method some years. The trench method can be used with any form of organic fertilizer or synthetic fertilizer. I like Dixondale's own fertilizer for use at planting time, although I don't buy it every year. I usually buy it and use it every other year. In the in-between years, I add lots and lots of organic matter in the fall and winter before planting onions in either February or March. I have clay soil that is mineral-rich, so mostly all I have to worry about is adding organic matter to improve its tilth and texture. With any kind of manure, even if it has been composted and even if it is from animals that people swear have never been fed any sort of feed that could be contaminated with herbicide residue, you still need to do a bio-assay test for herbicide residue. There is a specific type of herbicide commonly used on hay fields, pastures, and in city parks and golf courses that can persist even in the manure of animals long after they've eaten food raised with that herbicide sprayed on it. If it contaminates your garden seed, it can kill your crops and make your soil virtually unusable (except for corn and other monocots) for 1 to 4 or 5 years. Google "killer compost" or "herbicide carryover in manure or compost" to read about this long-term, ongoing issue that has been a problem throughout the 2000s if it is new to you. A couple of years ago, purchased, bagged compost killed gardens in a particular area, and the herbicide residue eventually was tracked back to name-brand horse feed that your or I or anyone else could walk in to a feed store and buy today. That's why we need to test all manure before we add it to our gardens----there is no guarantee that our animal feed wasn't contaminated with herbicide residue. A neighbor of ours inadvertently ruined her own garden a few years back by using manure from her animals and/or purchased hay as mulch. I don't believe she uses those herbicides on her place, but it was during drought years when ranchers were scrambling to buy hay from somebody....anybody.....in order to have something for their horses and cows to eat. I think that during that time, those herbicide residues were brought onto her place in purchased hay and then came into her garden either via hay mulch or animal manure. Rather than waiting for a unknown number of years for the soil to clear up, she decided to build a new garden in a new area----a workable option for folks on rural acreage who have lots of space, but not for someone on a standard city lot. You also can make manure or compost tea and feed it to the plants. That is another way to use clean, herbicide-free manure in a manner that won't burn plant roots. You dilute the manure tea after you make it until its color is the color of weak, watered-down iced tea. There are a couple of plants that are such heavy feeders that it can be hard to keep them happy---onions are sort of that way. They will devour any and all nitrogen you give them, and that's a good thing because lots of nitrogen makes lots of onions. With onions, the more nitrogen, the merrier. The number of leaves each onion plant has and the size of the leaves is what determines how big or small (along with rainfall) your onions will be. For big, softball-sized onions, your plants need regular access to plenty of nitrogen and roughly 21" of rainfall/irrigation during the plants' lives. With most plants, we urge folks not to overfeed nitrogen, but with onions, if you want big onions, shoot for producing big leaves and plenty of them. Each leaf gives you a layer or ring of onion flesh. Big leaves give you big thick rings or layers, small leaves give you smaller rings or layers. Early in their lives, I like the fertilizers that have more of a 1-2-1 ratio (like Dixondale's) to get the onions off to a good start. Then, a few weeks later, I like to give them some extra nitrogen to help the leaves make great growth. Having said that, sometimes I don't feed them at all and let them make all their growth merely of what is in my soil, but I do enrich the soil with copious amounts of compost every year. I often use Espoma's organic fertilizers, though I find myself not as happy as before with some that have been reformulated in recent years. Hope this helps, and feel free to ask more questions. Dawn Dixondale Farms' Onion Fertilizer Trench Technique

Normal for onions. They are hollow after all so even a good breeze can bend them over. Do you have a good shuffle (aka hula) hoe for weeding? Valuable tool to have. Even a short handled one would make quick work of all those weeds. Dave