Friday, May 24, 2013

Onions May 24, 2013

As a beginning gardener, I have found onions to be one of the easiest vegetables to grow.
They are available as:
Onion seeds (in packets like many other vegetable seeds),
Onion bulbs (very small dried bulbs in mesh bags), or
Onion sets (sprouted onion bulbs sold in bundles).
I like to buy the onion bulbs.
I divided this package of 80 bulbs into 4 groups. One group I gave to a friend.
The other three groups were planted 10 days apart in March.
We like long green onions so I cover the bulbs with about 3 inches (8 cm) of soil.
For larger, round onions, plant them more shallow and farther apart.
.
These were planted on March 8.
We pulled the first ones to eat seven weeks later on April 27. 
.
If onions are left in the ground long enough, they will bloom and make seed.
I plan to save seed from this one (planted last year) and sow them in the Autumn.
I have not done this before, so we will see how this experiment goes.
.
Occassionally there are twins!
.
Even if you have to buy all your other salad ingredients as I did this week,
(lettuce, tomatoes, baby carrots, mushrooms, and sweet pickles),
Adding home-grown onions makes it special!
.
In case you are wondering about my Black-Seeded Simpson Lettuce:
I am in the southeastern United States  zone 7.
When our temperatures go over 80F (26C), it is good-bye lettuce.
I can sow more seeds when the weather cools in September.
BTW, it is not unusual for our Summer temperatures to be over 100F (38C).
.
Happy Gardening!
.
If you are interested in growing your own salads,
Visit Veg Plotting for this month's Salad Days: Click Here!

5 comments:

  1. It's always fun to grow "something" that you can harvest and eat. I usually grow pots of herbs. Love to reach down and rub the leaves everytime I walk by. Mint, of course, is the "best" fragrance. Have a nice Memorial Day weekend. Mickie :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. You know I've never thought about planting them in stages. That's a very good idea.

    Happy holiday.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hi Lea - thanks for joining in this month :)

    I'm doing a similar experiment with some small garlic cloves I had left over this year. The idea is to harvest them as green garlic so we have garlic a little earlier than usual.

    BTW bees absolutely adore the flowers of any of the allium family!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hi Lea, growing your own beats anything you can buy! I haven't got much room to grow vegetables, and my garden is not very practical for growing veg either, but I have window baskets for salad, radish, beetroot and herbs. I have already had my first salad dinner this year, lovely :-)
    Take care, Helene.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I left one of my white onions in the ground in 2011 and it flowered profusely in 2012. It's a flower that bees absolutely adore so my veg patch was buzzing last year - hurray!! And I was able to save the seed in due course ;)

    ReplyDelete

I enjoy your comments!

Thank you for visiting!