Overwintering small onion starts

[reed]

I suppose it would be if you want big onions but I don't care. I figure it means they will multiply and make lots of smaller ones, I'd be happy with that.

[add] I'm thinking there might already be onions that you can harvest as a big onion if you want or you can leave it in the ground, let it rot and grow back as three or four smaller onions. Then you can eat them green or dig them up and divide to make more big ones. If they eventually turned into basically a wild onion only bigger and better than the ones that grow now that would be sweet. Never have to actually harvest and store more than a few at a time cause they are available fresh. Winter hardiness of course is important. 

[shoshannah]

My nursery had sets  for fall so I planted them today.

 Never left onions in beyond bolting so maybe  they

will grow as you say.  Interesting experiment.

[philagardener]

I have Fall-planted onions with fine success, but they do tend to bolt the next year.

[kazedwards]

I have never been able to grow onions in the spring. I would really like to learn how. I tried once with sets that only grew to around an inch and then again with seed. The seed ones ended up even smaller. Sounds like I need to try them in the fall. I think some of my problem is that I'm on the edge for long day onion. I have not tried day neutral and I'm a bit too far north for short day.

[reed]

I'm not gonna pay any attention to short, long or neutral day. I'm just gonna plant what I can get and let them figure it out.

[richardw]

yet i've only ever grown onions from seed in the spring.

[shoshannah]

Ilex on the True potatoonion seed thread said that regular onions will divide and become perennials.



A thought for Reed on his splitting onions.  My computer is down and have to use my kindle.  If someone will kindly 



Supply the link for me.  I very much like to experiment with the splitting onions since I always get some.

[reed]

I don't think I ever gave onions the respect they deserve, odd, seeing how important they are in the kitchen. Around here I grew up where you just buy some sets in spring, used to be at the local mill, now at the local big box. Anyway you buy some sets in the spring, pull them up whey they start to bloom and store em. maybe they would last all winter but often not. I do remember cleaning out the cellar at Granny and Granddad's house and finding onions that had sprouted but pretty sure they were all just tossed out. The impressive selection of varieties included red, white and yellow.

So many kinds and so much writing about them I ain't even gonna try to find specific ones for specific uses or pay much attention to when and how they should be planted. I'm just going to start a landrace and overwintering and usable for fresh harvest in one form or another year round is primary cause we don't have a good place to store them for use over winter.

I'll worry about details like which ones taste best or keep best out of the ground, best time to plant and that kind of stuff later.

[shoshannah]

From potato onion TPOS thread

Nov 12, 2012 9:18:16 GMT -8 ilex said:
There are many onions that are perennial and that will divide if given a chance. Usually not enough to be worth it, but anyway useful (no need to isolate and make seed almost every year). Onions that divide are usually culled, and it's not very common to check if they will survive flowering.

Mar 2, 2013 9:46:39 GMT -8 ilex said:
Quite a few regular onions will divide and become perennials if allowed to. Now they are usually culled. In fact I'm trying just that ... create a potato onion from regular onions. For me the tricky part is to fix how much they divide to make asexual propagation interesting, without overdoing it an ending with onions that are too small.

[paquebot]

They are supposed to split when mature in their second year. Their only purpose is to produce seeds at that point. Their genes tell them to make certain that if something happens to one stalk there are backups.

Martin

[galina]

I don't know how to be successful at deliberately making leek pips or leek grass (the equivalent of garlic bulbils), those tiny plants growing out of leek seed heads, but I know how it happens in nature. The theory is that you simply shave off the flower buds before they open and you get a flower head full of 'leek hair'. Because the leek is prevented from flowering, it switches to another mode of propagation. Well that didn't work so well for me when I tried it.

But when nature does the same thing, ie 4 weeks of solid rain and damp at flowering time (this is England and it happens that we get weeks without sun during summer!), then the ratio of seedpods to leek pips is very different. And when a summer storm bends a flower scape over and the seed head touches the ground, then the only thing we get is pips, the flowers will have rotted off. Almost like a walking onion.

When growing for leek seeds, it is worth checking the seedheads over for tiny plants. At least here, there always are a few. When I reported this to a gardening friend in Colorado USA, she said she had never seen it. Damp and wet seem to encourage it. Most are located at the base of the flower, probably where rain or dew doesn't dry off so easily.

[reed]

I found some onions that I had forgotten about. They are from the ones that were planted last fall as sets and lived through winter. They were harvested I guess in late spring. I remember they bloomed a little after the walking onions did. They nearly all rotted within weeks of harvest. There were a few that had divided, I already planted those and they are growing now but forgot there were a few more that didn't rot, was digging in the storage bin yesterday and came across them.



These already passed the tests of living through last winter and not rotting so I want seeds from them but here it is December and not sure how to proceed. Should I go ahead and plant or leave them in the storage and plant in spring? 

[philagardener]

I've planted in both Fall and Spring. My experience is that the ones that overwinter in the ground tend to bloom the next year, but that might be just what you want :>)

(I don't think your ground has frozen yet - just mulch heavily to give them a little time to adjust.)

[prairiegardens]

I got some onions given this fall which I would like to get seed from. Would it be possible to grow them through the winter under lights and hope for seed that would ripen in time to plant next year? Or is that a silly notion? Space under there is beginning to be at a premium so it if won't work then I'll use the space for something else, I've never grown onions so have no idea about them. But these are soooo much better than the store ones...

[richardw]

I think if you are wanting to get seed it would be better to plant out in spring, they will survive better.