No. 85: Two handfuls!

Our entire garlic collection is now complete, and we are busy shipping and reserving the thick pile of orders. If you haven't ordered yet: be quick, because varieties are selling out daily! I'll repeat the link to the available varieties, which is updated daily

Prepare your plant bed well and reread the extensive cultivation instructions, which also apply to onion sets and shallots. View our cultivation description for Garlic.

Now all other autumn onions (except for the Russian and Italian varieties) are in:
For delicious "fresh" onions, plant the ' Radar ' variety during these months and harvest them when half-grown in October-November. Under glass, you can let them continue to grow a little longer... this is a popular crop for growers who want to do a second planting.
More winter-hardy and thus harvestable from late spring are the ' Troy ' and ' Shakespeare ' onions.

The tastiest shallots are planted in the autumn; this year we can again supply both varieties:
' Griselle ' and ' Grisor '. The French swear by these two varieties, and a true connoisseur will confirm: this is how shallots should really taste!

There are even more special flavors to experience, you can find them extensively described on my website.
Take a look at these varieties that you can also plant from September: St. John's Onions, Wild Garlic, Russian Garlic, Serpent Garlic, Mouse Garlic, Perennial Leek, Pink Garlic, Italian Wild Onions and the Italian Wild Onion.

You can plant our fruit bushes all winter. We have included many new varieties and the growth has not stopped yet... You are, of course, very welcome to come and browse in our sales garden, which is packed with plants in optimal form, as far as that is possible this time of year... We also ship our bushes, of course!

A small group, which I want to keep small and special, are our non-edible, "Special Plants". You can find the 16 varieties here. These also include non-hardy or houseplants, see the descriptions.

You can start spreading slow-release fertilizer on your garden in the coming months. The annual pallets of Thomaskali and humus-saving Seaweed Lime will arrive next week, and our Organic Garden Soil is so rich in humus that it is rightly called Compost, a great base for the soil!

You can start spreading slow-release fertilizer in your garden in the coming months. The annual pallets of Thomaskali and the humus-saving Seaweed Lime will arrive next week, and our Organic Garden Soil is so rich in humus that it is rightly also called Compost, a good base for the soil!

Collection 2 consists of a beautifully shaped parasol tree with a matching male. This spring, I was truly impressed by these little trees; they were already bursting with young fruits!
We named this set “The Parasol and the Male”.

In early September, we started phase 1 of our large herbaceous plant garden sale. Those who ordered these sets back then naturally had the most choice, but we can still put together quite a few very interesting packages!

Phase 2 (as is the case with a clearance sale) is extra advantageous; we'd rather take a loss than have to care for the plants all winter. In short, under the motto: "our hardy and subtropical plants urgently need a new owner," you can now purchase a collection of plants worth €50.00 for only €19.95!

Our autumn-flowering bulbs really need to go into the ground now. We have safely stored them in the cold store, but for successful flowering, this cannot last for weeks longer. So we are also clearing out the last remaining stock here: beautiful autumn crocus, edible and ornamental saffron crocus, other autumn crocuses, and the cheerfully yellow Sternbergia. You can still purchase them at the full price, in which case you will, of course, get priority and be sure to have them. You can find them here. For the "Autumn-Flowering Bulbs Offer," we are putting together beautiful varieties worth € 30.00 and offering them for € 15.00.

My colleagues are almost all back from vacation now. The real preparations for the busy spring season are starting to become noticeable for part of the team. The rest of the team smells of fruit trees, flower bulbs, onions or garlic... because autumn is a semi-busy and very pleasant season.
I myself am busy describing new varieties on my website daily. You know you can see what's new each month, don't you? In September alone, already 81(!) novelties. Besides the pleasure of work and toil, we also empathize deeply with each other. 2 colleagues have seriously ill partners, there are sometimes minor and major illnesses within the team, 1 colleague (Anouk, see "meet us..." on our homepage) will become a grandmother next year while other colleagues would dearly love to have a child. Thus, our company is truly a mixing drum of joy and sorrow; it's nice to know each other and to sympathize with each other where possible.

My daughter Lisenke is back on her feet and sometimes lures me away from my workplace to enjoy my tiny granddaughter for a bit. I gladly let myself be tempted; some men don't have much with babies, but I find them fascinating and cuddly from the start! Maybe I can give so much love because I was the eleventh of a large family and thus had to/was able to endure some cuddling and caressing!
Fiep is a special baby: she already looks attentively and is very mobile, with her mouth and hands playing a leading role. She hardly makes fists; her fingers are always on the move...

To be continued!
Ton Vreeken, September 28, 2018