Onion Curing Time

[vfem]

Well Steve, your rocks are doing WAY better then my hay mulch did. The weeds just over took my garlic anyways!

Yours looks WAY fuller then mine ever did. Then again I had WAY fewer then you too. Maybe next year I'll expand. I do plant in October so mine have lots of time to develop compared to spring plantings. But that's a southern thang!

Journey, I do cut tops... but its because I'm lazy and trying to save space! HAHAHAHA

 

[digitS']

Honestly V, I prefer the sweet onions for scallions there for awhile.

The sweet onions will be thinned in a heavy handed fashion before they have a chance to develop bulbs. At that time, I will migrate on to the bunching onions which can provide scallions for the remainder of the season .

Steve

here are my onions from sets that I just washed. i always feel like someone else has grown them for me .

 

[so lucky]

Regarding growing onions for big bulbs, is there any benefit to pulling the soil away from the plant as the onion grows in diameter, or mounding up more soil around them? The bulbs look about an inch in diameter right now. They are kind of growing up out of the ground. Should they be covered with dirt?

 

[digitS']

Well, apparently the idea of hilling storage onions is something of an open question. Some people think that the benefit of avoiding sun damage should lead to light hilling.

I will go with what the extension sites seem to agree on: "Do not hill onions that are to be used as dry onions. Hilling may cause the necks of the stored bulb to rot."

I can see no reason to pull the soil away from the plants. Bulbs are the base of the leaves. They are forming above the roots anyway.

. . . just my 2.

Steve

 

[hangin'witthepeeps]

mmmmmm digitiS', those are some beautiful green onions.

I am trying the Bayou Gardeners way of planting onions this year. I bought some Candy onion seeds and I will be seeding them in a bed around September. Then supposedly in February/March I have my own "onion sets".

You guys are the best, I have learned so much from ya'll about a garden and the why's and why not's. And that it's okay to experiment and fail (even if everyone in your family said it would fail). Sometimes I just have to prove things to myself.

 

[HunkieDorie23]

It so funny that you guys are harvesting onions. I didn't even get mine in until May because of the weather. Then, I saw some onions sets on sale last week and bought some to fill in my empty spots and planted another row for good measure. I will be harvesting in July & August or September. They are really growing like crazy though. Soil is very warm now.

I also planted a few shallots this year, first time. How is curing shallots different from onions? I thought they were the same, but it is my first time. How I cure my onions... place on the grass under a shady tree for about a week or two, then trim the tops back to 1" and let them dry for another two weeks on the front porch or on the picnic table under same trees. One year I dried them on my propane tank. I just drapped them over the top for a couple of weeks. It worked out pretty well.

 

[journey11]

Steve, I don't hill my storage onions either and actually I plant them very shallow to begin with. But I've only been growing them for a couple of years now, so I'm no onion expert. I've had no trouble with them molding in storage and I don't spray them with fungicide either. Last year's onions made it all the way until February and that's when I used up the last one. I would think if they are healthy and growing well, the greens will do enough to shade the bulbs from the sun. That's been my experience, anyway.

 

[HunkieDorie23]

Steve, I don't hill my storage onions either and actually I plant them very shallow to begin with. But I've only been growing them for a couple of years now, so I'm no onion expert. I've had no trouble with them molding in storage and I don't spray them with fungicide either. Last year's onions made it all the way until February and that's when I used up the last one. I would think if they are healthy and growing well, the greens will do enough to shade the bulbs from the sun. That's been my experience, anyway.

I saw an article last year where the person actually took a brush and brushed the onions clean with only the roots in the soil. They onions looked awesome but I've never tried it.

 

[journey11]

Oh wow...they are adventurous. I would worry that one puff of wind would tear the roots out of the ground. We get some pretty high winds and big thunderstorms on my hill. That probably would make for a nice bulb though. I forget where I learned it, but I heard that burying the bulb too deeply inhibits it from filling out.

 

[HunkieDorie23]

Oh wow...they are adventurous. I would worry that one puff of wind would tear the roots out of the ground. We get some pretty high winds and big thunderstorms on my hill. That probably would make for a nice bulb though. I forget where I learned it, but I heard that burying the bulb too deeply inhibits it from filling out.

I think we are pretty close to the same storm zone and we live on top of a hill so it gets bad with some of our summer storms. I started hilling most of our vegetables just to give them better gripping power. I did it with my corn a couple of years ago and we had one of those storms at 4:00 am. I just laid there and prayed. When the sun came up I had to stand up about 8-10 stalks, but a lot of people on the ridge had their garden laid completely on the ground. Now my husband hills our corn religiously. Which is awesome because I don't have too.