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Growing and Harvesting Onions

No home garden is complete without onions. They are easy to grow and take little space.

Plant regular onion sets grown from seeds in early spring. You can harvest green onions in late spring, and bulb onions during the summer and fall. Bulb onions from these sets generally do not store well. Harvest as soon as the tops fall over. Cure and keep onions in a cool, dry place.

Start American type onions from seeds. Sow them directly in the garden in early spring. Thin seedlings to six or less per square foot of soil. Pull the bulbs with the tops on as soon as the tops fall over. Do not break over the green tops. Cure them with the tops on for 2 or 3 weeks. Once the tops are dry, cut them off one inch from the bulb. Cure the bulbs for another 2 or 3 weeks before you store them in a cold, dry place.

Most home gardeners also grow a few short rows of the mild-flavored sweet Spanish onions, especially for sandwiches, salads, fried onion rings and buttered onion rings. A good selection is Riverside Sweet Spanish. Start with a disease free growing mixture. Space them four to six inches apart. After the seedlings get to be five inches tall, keep them clipped back to four inches so that they will remain upright.

Transplant seedlings to the garden around May 1 with plants at least four inches apart in the row and with eighteen inches between rows. Harvest bulbs with the tops on in the late fall when the tops begin to fall over. Dry for two or three weeks in a dry, well-ventilated place. Cut the tops to one inch or so from the bulb, and cure for another two or three weeks before storing in a cool, dry place.

For additional information, call your county office of the NDSU Extension Service.

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For More Information Contact your North Dakota County Extension Office of the NDSU Extension Service for additional information or see our main NDSU Web Page for publications and articles on Agriculture, Horticulture, Youth and Family, Business and Community and Food and Nutrition at  http://www.ag.ndsu.nodak.edu/