A new collection of perennial vegetables from the garden on 25th April 2020, now back to cool, overcast weather. All are managed in some way.
Carum carvi (caraway / karve) greens
Urtica dioica (nettle / nesle)
Aegopodium podograria (ground elder / skvallerkål)
Allium fistulosum (Welsh onion /pipeløk)
Hablitzia tamnoides (Caucasian spinach / stjernemelde)
Campanula latifolia (giant bellflower / storklokke)
Myrrhis odorata (sweet cicely / spansk kjørvel)
Allium ursinum (ramsons / ramsløk)
Taraxacum spp. (dandelion / løvetann)
Tag Archives: Allium fistulosum
More from the garden
We seem to be at least a month ahead of normal this year. I don’t normally see new shoots of ground elder (Aegopodium) until the middle of April but this year they are popping up all over the place.
Today’s veggies are a bit different from yesterday as it depends which part of the garden I harvest from. They are:
Hablitzia tamnoides (Caucasian spinach; stjernemelde)
Aegopodium podograria (ground elder; skvallerkål)
Rumex acetosa (non-flowering) (sorrel; engsyre)
Rumex patientia (patience dock; hagesyre)
Taraxacum officinale (dandelion; løvetann)
Allium fistulosum (welsh onion; pipeløk)
Allium paradoxum
Allium x proliferum (Egyptian onion; luftløk)
Myrrhis odorata (sweet cicely; spansk kjørvel)
Allium cernuum (nodding onion; prærieløk)
Hemerocallis (day lily shoots; daglilje)
These were used in a delicious vegetable pea soup!
Pricking out Alliums
It was warm enough to sit outside yesterday and “prick out” (i.e., transplant into bigger pots) all the spring onions and leeks I’d sown a week ago inside. Neither Allium cepa, Allium fistulosum nor Allium ampeloprasum (porrum) need cold treatment to germinate unlike many other Alliums. Of the 40 varieties I sowed, about 28 germinated (some of the seed was a few years old). I’m still searching for a spring onion that is hardy enough to sow in late summer here so that I can harvest in early summer. The best bet is one of the cultivars of Allium fistulosum used for spring onions, but most of the modern varieties, mostly bred in Japan, have lost the hardiness of the species (from Siberia).
Valbjør Gård and Nordigard Aukrust!
On the bus from the train at Otta to Lom the evening before, I noticed a sign to Valbjør Farm, which my friend and Norwegian Seed Saver (KVANN) Andrew McMillion had visited in 2015. During the visit he had found Allium fistulosum growing on one of the turf roofs and had been given a few onions which he has since shared through KVANN’s Year Book. 10 years ago, I had been on a tour of nearby onion turf roofs near Otta and Vågå (see http://www.edimentals.com/blog/?p=14436). I had heard that there were also onions at Valbjør but hadn’t yet been there. It turned out that the woman who offered to give me a lift from the course at Lom back to Otta, had been at one of my talks some years ago in Heidal. I asked her if we could see Valbjør up on the hills from the main road and told her about the onion roof! Even better, she said, we’ll make a detour to the place.
So, it came to pass that we spent 45 minutes or so at the farm and met the long-term organic farmer, Kai Valbjør, who had run the farm organically since the 1980s and, it turned out, was one of the open organic gardens in the national Norwegian organic network which we and Nordigard Aukrust were part of!! It’s all interconnected!! There was also an overgrown herb garden. Valbjør Farm comprises 13 restored buildings from the 17th, 18th and 19th century and is protected by law. A young couple, Ola og Kjerstin Kaurstad, had bought the farm last year and, in particular, Kjerstin was very interested to learn more about the herbs that had survived, despite the neglect. We spent some time looking for herbs and I took a few with me, in case they turn out to be old! There were a few more surprises, see the album at the bottom of this page!
Where did the Valbjør onions come from?
It turned out that the roof onions at Valbjør had not been there for long and had come from another location. Initial information was that they came from Sve Farm (which I had visited and already had onions in the national onion collection at the Ringve Botanical Garden in Trondheim. Kai Valbjør told that Andrew that they had been given them from herbalist Adi Bertoli at Sjoa. Adi was not sure that it was she who had given the onions to Valbjør, but her roof onions came from seed she was given by botanist Hans Shwenke in Otta (who had been on the tour of roof onion locations 10 years previously). Adi remembered that Hans had his onions from a place called Steberløkken in Kvam. Hans confirmed that the farm was probably called Næsset.
Nordigard Aukrust and Lom:
Oslo Allium Raid
12th June: Added pictures of a few more edibles!
9th April veggies
Lots of Hablitzia (stjernemelde), ground elder (skvallerkål), Svenskelauk (a form of Allium fistulosum), sweet cicely (spansk kjørvel), dandelion (løvetann), day lily shoots (daglilje), blanched horseradish shoots (pepperrot) and a variety of Allium victorialis (victory onion, seiersløk) which is the earliest form I grow along with one from the Kola peninsular in northern Russia; other varieties have hardly grown yet!
January vegetables from cellar and window sills
New study of old Norwegian roof onions!
The Roof Onions of Gudbrandsdalen in Norway
He had arranged visits to 5 different farms near Otta and Vågå. Two local botanists had also been invited along: Hans Petter Schwencke and Bjørn Engehagen.
One Norwegian botanist thinks that as these roof onions have developed over such a long time in this very special environment that they should be lifted to species level. I suggest Allium gudbrandsdaliensis ;)
Geir also blogged about the tour here http://www.otta2000.com/Diverse/Pipeloek/pipeloek.htm#Prosjektleder_
Below are a series of pictures from these farms: Søre Breden where owners Knut Romsås Breden og Eldri Seim met us; Hole; Nordre Gjetsiden; Nerøygarden (where Ingrid Dokken and her husband met us)and, finally, Sve Gård in Vågå kommune where farmer Harald Bjørndal showed us around. At the bottom is a document in Norwegian which I wrote after the visit. The story of these onions is also told in my book Around the World in 80 plants!
The Allium garden at Ringve
Preparing Allium cernuum accessions for Ringve at home:
Sunset and the new Allium bed with the accompaniment of screaming (approving) swifts! Life is good!!