Does this mean my onions are ready?

[Rahab222]

I'm posting a picture of my red onions whose tops are lying over on the ground. Some of the bulbs are showing above the soil - not the whole bulb. I planted these last fall. Does this mean these onions are ready and I need to pick them or do I add more dirt to cover the protruding bulbs and let them grow some more? See picture.

Thanks!

 

[majorcatfish]

Would gently dig around one of them and see how large they are! My guess is they are ready
generally onions are ready at any size...

 

[w_r_ranch]

An onion is done growing when the green tops lose their color & 'fall over'... Once all of the tops are fallen, give the onions another 10 to 14 days to fully mature before harvesting & curing.

The only exception to the 'fall over' signal is when an onion bolts, which means it sends up a flower stalk. If this happens, harvest immediately because it won't grow any larger. In addition, the quality of the onion will be affected since the flower stalk comes from the center of the onion. You'll also want to use these onions quickly because they don't store well.

 

[ErnieCopp]

I agree with the above comments, but could the wind or rain have knocked them down? When my crop fell over the tops were not as neat and in as uniform direction. I see one crumpled plant near the top of the picture, that looked like mine. But now that the tops are down, regardless of why, you may as well go ahead and dig them. I let mine dry a few days outside before i store them, and best to keep from touching each other if you have the room.
Ernie

 

[Rahab222]

Thank you all for your responses. My confusion came because the tops haven't died, they're still green. I have used a couple of these and the flavor is really good, but not as hot as those in the store (which I like). I read a post where someone had planted "hard neck" stalk garlic and they hadn't fallen over, but the garlic was ready. I didn't know there was a difference.

Do I spread these onions out to dry them outdoors, even though our humidity is coming back? Or do I need to dry them indoors because of the humidity. Do I remove the stalk to dry them? Can I just leave them where they are and pull them as I use them so they don't go bad or get wasted? I use A LOT of onion, peppers, tomatoes, etc. so that's mostly what I plant. The purple onions are $2.49/lb. at the store, but my onions aren't as large as the store bought ones. Thanks again!

 

[ErnieCopp]

I think you should follow what W-R says as his climate is similar to yours. I dry mine outside because we have low humidity and no rain this time of year. You should at least cover them at night and during the rain, if you do try to dry them outside.
Dixon farms, where i buy my small ones, say Sweet Onions, which Red onions usually are, will last about 3 months, and they never get real hot. i think you should go ahead and at least dig the ones that have the fallen tops. Good luck with them.

Ernie

 

[Rahab222]

Okay, Ernie. I'll pull some of my red onions tomorrow.

Also, I planted some multiplying onions last fall and don't have a clue what to do with these. All of these have bolted and have a really cool, sphere shaped flower on the end of the stalks. But all the bulbs are grown together like garlic. What do you do with multiplying onions? Eat the actual bulb or just the green stalk? By their name, I thought they just continued to "multiply" forever and you just used them as needed. I didn't know there was a timeline. I threw one over the back fence to the bayou to make room for another tomato plant, since I didn't know you could use them once they bolted. My lettuce sure was bitter once it bolted, so I decided not to plant any more until fall because of the summer heat.

 

[ErnieCopp]

If you do not have a good place to spread your onions out to dry, My sister used to braid the onion stems together and hang them on her porch to dry.,. I never did that, but it seems simple enough to figure it out. She would make long strings of them. I am not familiar with bunching onions.

Ernie

 

[Rahab222]

I've got space to spread them out. I just wasn't sure about the effects of the humidity - if it might cause them to mold, etc. I'll pull a few tomorrow and do a test. Thanks for all you input.

 

[w_r_ranch]

Also, I planted some multiplying onions last fall and don't have a clue what to do with these. All of these have bolted and have a really cool, sphere shaped flower on the end of the stalks. But all the bulbs are grown together like garlic. What do you do with multiplying onions? Eat the actual bulb or just the green stalk? By their name, I thought they just continued to "multiply" forever and you just used them as needed. I didn't know there was a timeline. I threw one over the back fence to the bayou to make room for another tomato plant, since I didn't know you could use them once they bolted.

They are actually called Egyptian Walking Onions. It produces a small shallot-like onion which can be harvested. Once harvested, however, the plant will obviously not grow back. If left in the ground, the onion will divide and form a cluster of onion bulbs. New leaves and topsets will grow from the onions each year. The name "Walking Onion" was given to this plant because it literally walks to new locations. When the cluster of topsets becomes heavy enough, it will pull the plant over to the ground. Depending on how tall the plant is and where the bend occurs, the topsets may fall up to 3 feet away from the base of the plant. Here, if the conditions are right, they will take root and grow new plants. When these new plants mature, their topsets will eventually fall to the ground and start the process all over again. Egyptian Walking Onion plants can walk between 1 and 3 feet per year.

Egyptian Walking Onions taste just like a regular onion, only with a bit more pizzazz!!! The entire plant can be eaten. Small onions form at the base in the soil. They can be eaten and prepared just like any other onion. The hollow greens may be chopped to eat like chives or green onions. They are excellent when fried, cooked in soups, or raw in salads (my favorite). The topsets are excellent when peeled & fried. You can even pickle them... or just pop them in your mouth like popcorn!

 

[Rahab222]

Sam - Sounds downright alien like. I'm glad they can only travel 1-3 feet/year! Okay, so if my Walking Onions have already bolted with that beautiful, flower-like sphere on the tips; I can just leave the plant there and it will continue to reproduce, OR, I can pull them up and use them like you describe above. Do they ever go "bad" in the ground where you wouldn't want to eat them - like when lettuce bolts and becomes bitter? I'm trying to figure out how to cook more (as I'm so impressed by all the grillers/cooks on this site), but the truth is, I tend to eat things "straight up" - like a tomato is eaten as a tomato - not tomato sauce, etc. However, I am pretty good at slicing and dicing ingredients up for a salad. I'm also trying to learn how to can things that only require a water bath - not a pressure cooker, as I'm sure I would blow myself up. A lot depends on my tomato and cucumber crops this year - here's hoping they're BOUNTIFUL!

 

[Rahab222]

With the sky tumbling down over the Houston area for the past two days and an anticipated continuance through the weekend, I pulled most of my remaining purple onions, whose stalks had fallen over; washed them and put them in the fridge because I plan to eat/use these soon. As for my 1014 onions that I only planted in the spring of 2014, but whose stalks have fallen over, I pulled as many of these as I could between rain storms. I braided them and hung them on nails in the garage to dry, as Ernie suggested. I left the dirt on them. If you notice, the 1014's are only about the size of golf balls, but the purple onions are small, too. These are nothing like the large ones you see in the grocery stores. Should mine be bigger? Should I leave them in the ground to see if they grow more, even though the stalks have fallen over or this is as good as I'm going to get? If this is where they are supposed to be, I need to harvest the rest of them tomorrow. I'm concerned about Houston getting water logged and my onions rotting in the ground; even though they are small. Sweet, yellow onions I planted last fall still have stalks that are upright. I dug around in the dirt and can see these onions are much larger - about the size of oranges or grapefruits.

 

[w_r_ranch]

Next time don't harvest them (or potatoes) when it's wet. Also, spread them out & allow them to cure for a while before braiding them so that the moisture doesn't facilitate conditions for fungus/rot...

 

[Rahab222]

I got my potatoes I hung in the garage out on Weds., washed them off and now have them spread out and drying on an elevated rack in the kitchen. There's too much moisture and humidity in the air, due to the rains, to dry them outdoors.

 

[ErnieCopp]

i remember that terrible humidity as a boy in Kansas, maybe not as bad as Houston, but still pretty wet. Probably nearly as humid in your house but the main thing is like Sam said, spread them out, and turn them over once in a while, so all parts have a chance to dry.

Melons of all types are just blooming and setting fruit like crazy but Tomatoes need more of both. Things are much different each year in the Garden. Tired of picking blackberries, and wish the birds that ate a lot of them last year were here, and i would let them have the rest, but so dry here our bird population is down 75%, and since there are no bugs, their are no flycatchers and bug eaters at all.

Ernie

 

[Rahab222]

Ernie; I'll take your blackberries and turn them into jam and cobblers. I was in the grocery store today and they were advertising their blackberries over the PA for $1.98/6 ozs. I paid .91 or .98/6 oz. last week when I made jam. Maybe you can set yourself up a roadside stand and sell any extras. Or, get you a booth at a local, Farmer's Market.

I woo the birds to my yard with a large Mulberry Tree in the back corner. The tree is too tall for me to pick the berries, but the birds love them. I also feed them from feeders in the front yard. I only put bird baths in the back garden area. A lot of birds nest in the trees along the bayou and in my yard, so they always have a birds eye view of insects or ongoings in my yard/garden. They love it when I till up the soil, as they can see the earthworms and grubs it uncovers. I also have a lot of frogs and lizards. Hopefully, everybody's eating their fill of mosquitoes right now.

I inspected my tomatoes and pepper plants for blooms today. Very few due to the rain and wind knocking them off. My tomato plants are heavy with green tomatoes, I'm just concerned about the next round - if there will be one, as the rain is coming back today - Friday. The system that came through Houston earlier in the week is now sitting over Louisiana and drenching them; but the weather forecasters here say the system is backing up and going to hit us again. Very strange weather.

 

[ErnieCopp]

Rahab,
I have offered the blackberries to people if they will pick them, but no one has shown up. I pick melons and dig onions to give away since neither of those have the fishhook thorns. We have both compote and freezer jam from them, and i am going to pick one more time. My daughter is coming down Father's Day, but they will be gone by then so i will pick and Linda will preserve some for her with artificial sweetener.

I keep two big birdfeeders, as some birds like grain and some prefer oil seeds, but just not many birds here this year.

We have big hard shell Pecan trees, only ones i have seen in CA, and crows fly high with the nuts and drop them on the driveway to crack them.

Water is rationed out here by raising the price, so most people have had to let their lawns die, and do not try to garden. I have combined my travel and recreation budgets with the garden budget, so i have been able to pay the 900 dollar bi-monthly water bills so far. But that does make very expensive watermelons.

Ernie

 

[Rahab222]

Ernie; Wow, the water situation in CA sounds worse than what I've read. Our section has been in drought the past couple of years, too. That's another big reason I try to keep food and water out for the birds. I'd say the lack of birds is a definite sign of how bad your drought is. Two years ago, there was so little food for hawks in our section, they invaded our section and wiped out every single feral cat and small dog they could locate. It was good news on the feral cats, but my cat was an in-and-outter and he got picked off one morning, too. Just disappeared into thin air and I knew the hawks roosting in our trees had used him for breakfast because he refused to come in the house at bedtime when I called him.

I can't believe people haven't taken you up on your blackberries. They are quickly becoming my favorite food.

 

[ErnieCopp]

Birds can usually find water to drink but in dry seasons there are not very many bugs, and without the bugs some birds starve and do raise young. I had a lot of barn swallows in Idaho, and one summer was very dry, The Swallows would fly themselves to death and fall out of the sky seeking bugs to feed their babies. I think all that swallows eat is the bugs they catch on the fly.

But i was thinking last night that we only have about 20 percent of the birds we had last year, and none at all of some varieties.

Noticeing that the bad bugs only liked one plant is how you gain wisdom. Diseases usually like certain plants, too. I tried three times to raise a Hitachi Jap Persimmon here and all were killed with black spot fungus, but i planted a different type of Jap persimmon and it has not had one black spot on it.

Ernie

 

[Rahab222]

Ernie; That's an amazing tidbit about the swallows dying in flight trying to catch insects for their young. The birds are my entertainment and very soothing to watch, so I feed them. I think the same pairs come back each year. I have Cardinals, Blue Jays, Chickadees, Hummingbirds, Mockingbirds, LOTS of Dove, etc. They can flat drain my feeders - Quickly! One bird I haven't seen this year, that is a favorite and one of the first to appear in the spring are the red-tipped, Blackbirds. These are really pretty.

Black spot fungus - what causes that? I planted a 7-year-old, Joey avocado tree in March and it's dying. There are black spots on the trunks and all the upper branches are black, though part of the trunk is still green. All the leaves have died. I need to take a picture and post it for opinions here.

 

[ErnieCopp]

Swallows, as you probably know, apparently do all their eating and drinking on the wing. I have never seen one land except at their nests. There was quite a bit of driveway in front of the barn, and i found several laying in the driveway where they had fell after leaviing their nests.
Be sure the birds are not wasting a lot of feed. If there is some place they can flip it, they will throw away more than they eat.

If the black spots cover the trunk solid, it sounds like you may have black mold, but the Black Spot that killed the Persimmon trees is a virus, i think and it leaves little black spots on the leaves and they die. I do not recall the trunk or branches being black. I forget the name, but Google Black Spot virus and there is lots of info on there.

We have different fungus here but Copper spray like Kocide takes pretty good care of that.

7 year old trees of most kind are very hard to transplant unless they are balled and burlapped, so the root ball is not disturbed. When you planted it, were the roots disturbed in the root ball? The rootball should have one foot of diameter for every inch of trunk diameter, like a 24 inch rootball for a tree with a 2 inch diameter trunk, and more is better. If the roots were bare, it probably died of transplant shock.

Ernie

 

[Rahab222]

The roots were bare. Should I try spraying it with the copper spray I used on my cucumbers? My lawn man dug the hole and just set it in the ground, as it came out of the container. Should I dig it up and start over somehow?

 

[ErnieCopp]

Rahab,
If it was still in a large, say 15 gallon Nursery container at 7 years of age, it may have been root bound as that is a very long time to leave a tree in a nursery container. Some roots showing on the outside of the rootball when you take it out of a container is natural. What is the diameter of the tree trunk about a foot above the ground? I assumed at that age you had it transplanted from another location, and by bare root i meant the dirt was either gone or very loose around the roots. So if the dirt all shook off the roots, leaving it bare as you say, it should not have been sold as a containerised tree. Avocados that i have seen do not lose all of their leaves so they should never be transplanted as bare root.

If you bought it from a Nursery last year and it did not do well this year, he might replace it. If you have had it longer than that he probably will not.

On the black stuff, Go on Google and describe it, asking what it is and you will find a lot of pictures of different diseases lthat it might be, and you can compare your tree to the pictures you will find. I would not waste the copper on it until i found out what it is. I am sure others in your locality will be familiar with the black stuff.

Or post a picture of it here and someone may be able to tell you what the black stuff is.

Good luck,
Ernie

 

[Rahab222]

Thanks, Ernie. I'll check with the plant place first and see if they'll replace it. I bought it last September and planted it in March, 2014.