In domestic supermarkets, Solo garlic is increasingly found. Unlike regular garlic, this Chinese variety has whole heads consisting of one clove. Such garlic is not cheap, so we will find out whether it is possible to grow Solo in your garden.
Chinese garlic "Solo"
garlic one-tooth "Solo"
garlic "solo" grown from an onion bulb (a large bulb, the size of a pea)
Description of garlic "Solo"
Garlic "Solo" is often called Chinese. It is in China that garlic is grown more than anywhere else. Therefore, most of the garlic products on the shelves of Russia - from China. In addition to Chinese farmers, Indian and Peruvian farmers are engaged in massive cultivation of single-tooth garlic.
The culture in question cannot be called a "variety." Garlics in the form of onion-tooth bulbs are obtained, creating certain growing conditions. To grow “Solo”, and not just ordinary multi-tooth garlic, you need:
- soil of a certain composition and fertility;
- high-tech planting care.
Garlic “Solo” is not a variety, but a product of special agricultural technologies.
Bulbs of Solo garlic are covered with a thin white husk. There may be purple streaks. The diameter of one garlic is 25-50 mm.
The main advantages of the solo version:
- ease of cleaning;
- excellent garlic taste.
The cost of 1 kg of Solo garlic is 800-1200 rubles. They sell single-tooth heads in attractive packaging for consumers - small rectangular baskets.
Features of planting Chinese garlic
Our gardeners have mastered the cultivation of a variety of exotic crops. It is not surprising that many are interested in whether solo-garlic can be grown on its own. Given the market value of the described product, the issue acquires a commercial component. Let's try to understand the issue.
In China, winter solo-garlic is grown in provinces where winter temperatures do not fall below + 5 ° C. As a heater, rice straw is used here. Of the harvest, only 70% are solo bulbs, and 30% are ordinary multi-tooth heads.
It turns out that solo-garlic is just a large single-tooth, grown from air bulbs. These bulbs are taken in a spherical inflorescence formed at the end of the garlic shooters. By the way, this method of growing garlic is not a secret for many of our gardeners. With the help of bulbs, varieties are usually updated, restoring their varietal characteristics.
It turns out that in order to get solo-garlic, it is enough to grow large single tooth. Such garlic is usually grown in regions with mild winters, planting bulbs:
- In the fall. Bulbs are planted 10 days before the usual planting of garlic. They manage to take root firmly, and in the spring they grow quickly, forming large single-tooth.
- In the spring. If in the fall it is not possible to plant bulbs, sowing is carried out in the spring. But they plant air onions as early as possible. The yield of spring sowing is always lower than autumn.
In order for the crop to consist of large single tooth, with a diameter of more than 1.5 cm, bulbs with a diameter of 5 mm or more are selected for planting. If you plant the bulbs d = 2-3 mm, then the single teeth are small.
The dependence of the size of the tooth on the diameter of the air bulbs:
Diameter of onions (bulbs), mm | Harvest, t / ha | The output of single-tooth heads of different sizes,% | ||
more than 1.5 cm | 1-1.5 cm | less than 1 cm | ||
5 and more | 2,15 | 72 | 26 | 2 |
3-5 | 1,05 | 64 | 24 | 12 |
2-3 | 0,74 | — | 46 | 54 |
Schemes for seeding bulbs:
- In the gardens, the lowercase method is used. Between the lines, the intervals are 20-25 cm.
- For large-scale cultivation, a wide-line or tape method is used. The distance between the tapes / lines is selected individually by the farmer.
The seeding rate of bulbs 3-5 mm - 100-200 kg per 1 ha, from 5 mm - 300-500 kg per 1 ha. On 1 running meter 40-50 bulbs grow.
Buns are buried by 4-5 cm. Be sure to sprinkle planting with peat or humus. Layer of mulch -2-3 cm.
Proper care
To get solo-garlic in a temperate climate, it is necessary to create special conditions for the culture:
- the soil must be fertile;
- regular feeding, loosening and watering are necessary.
Onion crop care:
- Loosening. Aisles carefully loosen, simultaneously destroying weeds.
- Watering. Without them, large one-tooth cannot be obtained. It is especially important to water plantings in May - 1-2 times.
- Top dressing. The first - at the end of March, the second - in the first days of May. Doses are standard for winter garlic. It is advisable to improve the quality of the soil by adding wood ash - 0.5 cups per 1 sq. Km. m
Collection and storage
It is important to remove odnozubki in time. The leaves of garlic grown from bulbs quickly dry and die, and if you are late, the onion begins to deepen - harvesting is difficult. Moreover, losses are increasing.
The procedure for harvesting “solo onions”:
- Removing a single tooth from the ground. The roots of plants are trimmed with staples.
- Removing garlic from the soil, leave it in place - to dry. It is laid right along the lines.
- Dry the crop completely. If the weather is rainy, the garlic is dried, folded under a canopy, in the attic or in the greenhouse from the film.
- The dried bulbs remove the stem and roots.
- Shaking off the bulbs, odnozubki from the ground, hide them in storage - in a dark, dry, well-ventilated room.
Why is Solo little in demand in the Russian market?
Solo is positioned as a Chinese product, and the reaction of Russian consumers to Chinese products is well known. Especially when it comes to food products. Solo-garlic has proven itself excellently among housewives - it is well stored, without sprouting or drying out for a long time, it is easy to clean and has good taste characteristics.
An overview of this variety of garlic can be seen in the video below:
The reason for the unprecedented durability of solo-garlic is that experts and consumers suspect chemical treatment. Chinese producers have long been “famous” for their commitment to pickling vegetables of various kinds with “chemistry” for the sake of maintaining their presentation. Russians, listening to nutritionists, prefer Chinese produce, seasonal vegetables.
Another thing is when to grow such garlic yourself and then propagate it with your own, and not with purchased material.
Truth and myths about Chinese garlic
If we talk about the cultivation of Chinese varieties of garlic, then there is no agreement among gardeners. There are many myths around this culture, for example:
- Chinese varieties of garlic are not suitable for cultivation in Russia. If the heads grow, they will be tasteless. In fact, studies have shown that most varieties from China grow safely in our gardens.
- All garlic from China - GMO. Belonging to China is not a reason to believe that garlic is a genetic modification. Today, any product on the shelves can be from the category of GMOs, and this is not something dangerous to human health. It’s just that changes are artificially made to the genetic code of plants, for example, so that the plant is resistant to insects or the use of herbicides (weed control products). Human genetics from the use of such products is not able to change, as when eating raw fish, gills do not grow in a person. The thing is the lack of consumer knowledge in the field of genetics.
We found that solo garlic is not a variety. To grow whole, single-tooth garlic, not cloves of garlic are used as seed, but bulbs from inflorescences. Odnozubki can be used for food and planting - to update the variety.
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Russia. City Novosibirsk
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