Re: [gardeners] Wednesday
Jane Burdekin (gardeners@globalgarden.com)
Thu, 10 Sep 1998 11:49:03 -0600
Hi Margaret,
It sounds like you and your friend had a great day. Also sounds a little
like my mom and I driving around southern Calif over labor day weekend.
She doesn't read maps or drive, so I had to look at the map before we left
and write down the directions for her to read off. We did have a great
trip even with a few U-turns. I'm still waiting for the box of plants I
shipped back from my Aunt's house. New orchids, kolancho, plumeria, and a
few other goodies. I'm just sure it will arrive today. Sure wish I
could bring home some of that blooming jasmine and plumeria. The smell is
heavenly.
Jane
>A gardening friend and I took our annual trip westward yesterday to buy a
>winter's supply of onions. Sweet spanish onions are a major crop for
>eastern Oregon and southwestern Idaho, and they are of outstanding quality.
> The good news is bad news for farmers: the price is lower than usual. We
>bought 50 lbs. of jumbo onions for $6, and 50 lbs. of mediums for $4. In
>previous years the prices of each were $1 more than those prices. If it
>doesn't stop raining here soon, the prices will jump. Onions have been
>pulled and are lying in the muddy fields. If they rot, prices will rise
>quickly. The first packing house we went to, the one we usually buy onions
>from, didn't have any onions, even unsorted ones in a bin. They won't
>resume operations until the fields dry out. But the owner of that plant
>told us how to get to another plant that he said was still rolling. As we
>usually do, we stopped in Notus to visit the general store there. It
>caters to Mexican farm workers and carries everything from boots to blades,
>and every Spanish-named herb known to humans. The candy case held the
>white coconut candies with bright pink ends, and a few other candies, but
>they didn't have my favorite, Dulce de Leche. While my friend discussed
>the merits of vermicides (!) with the sales clerk, I continued browsing,
>and found packaged dulce de leche. Okay, so it's colored differently.
>Just won't be the same in a sanitary wrapper as it was being pawed over by
>everyone who opened the candy door.
>
>It had been raining that morning, and an awesome bank of tattered clouds
>stretched south to north, from horizon to horizon. By the time we got our
>onions in the back of the little pickup it was almost noon, so we decided
>to go to Oregon for lunch. Nyssa, Ore., was just ten miles distant.
>Crossed into Pacific time zone, I think, and into a state without sales
>tax. Not a bad lunch, but you don't see someone grilling chicken breasts
>on a gas barbecue on Main street every day. Or see a restaurant that's
>also a quilt shop and gift store. Neither of us had been out that highway,
>so it was interesting. My friend didn't have her reading glasses with her,
>so she was busy misreading a road map. I said "I think we're traveling
>north. I don't want to go north." I finally pulled off the road and
>looked at the map, then turned around and traveled south.
>
>The only thing we didn't do this time is visit a remote greenhouse from
>which we've purchased a lot of plants at reasonable prices. My friend is
>just going out of the nursery business, and I have a ton of plants that
>have never been put in the ground. We didn't need to go there, GA or not.
>Anyway, I've got some darned good-looking winter onions. My only concern
>is that the skins are thin, and I'm expecting a hard La Nina winter. Don't
>onion skins toughen and thicken just before a hard winter? Margaret, in
>Boise