Over-wintered onions. Harvest?

[zazen999]

Finney, I've merged your thread with another on the same subject that ran a few days ago.

[finney]

zazen,

i had a look last night at the flowers on my winter onions,i forgot to tell you that i planted red and awhite onions seperate but the flowers are only on the white ones,not the red do the perform flowers to or not,i pulled one out but it didnt look very red inside do they require a longer time.

[zazen999]

Red onions do flower, yes. Not at the same time in your case, obviously - but all onions will flower in their second year. Given time, they will.

Not sure what you mean about them not looking red inside, all my reds have red inside. Are they red on the outside?

[sallym]

Sorry to be thick Guys, but I am confused. (not unusual)
I planted my Red and White Onions in October so are these overwintered onions that can't be stored? When do you plant the ones that can be dried and stored.

[SlugLobber]

Good question, Sally. I started eating mine three weeks ago, just picking out the larger ones and so leaving the others to grow a bit more.

Didn't realise that about the nipping off of seed heads! Haven't noticed any on mine, yet, but so glad I read this thread!!

[zazen999]

The Japanese bred overwintering onions to fill the gap whilst the usual spring sown onions were growing. As Sarz says above, they can go brown and be kept, but not for as long as storage onions.

If you want storage onions, then the seed needs to be sown in the winter and sets need to be sown in the spring, once hard frosts are mostly gone.

[sallym]

Thanks Zazen. Will know what to do from now on. Spring sets it is then.

[Emmylou]

( I wasn't aware they couldn't be stored either, till I read it on the vine! I have about 250 to get used up !!!! Fed them and hoping they will grow a bit more now. I'll not grown so many next year and put more in in the spring)

[vicky]

If you have a lot you can chop them up and freeze them.

[Emmylou]

If you have a lot you can chop them up and freeze them.

Do they need anything doing other than chopping up ?
Never frozen onions before, but I think I will be doing

[FionaH]

So glad I found this thread! I found flowers on my autumn planted onions today, what a great excuse to start eating them Will definitely plant more onions in the spring planting, only did a few this year. Ah well live and learn. Thanks to all for the great info

And thanks for the merge Zazen it helped

[finney]

thanks for all the great advice now i know what to do eachyear,

happy Growing all the best

Finney

[RobintheBobin]

Bolting Onions!!!

My Red Baron onions seem to be trying to bolt I've snipped the flower stems off but are they done for?

Help

RtB
xx

[Lazgaot]

We had some old onions that we didn't harvest last year that sprouted this year, grew nice and big and have now bolted. We've just pulled them and will eat what we can of them.

[amandaandherveg]

My red onions bolted very early last year so didn't bother with them this time around. They weren't huge but I did manage to make a huge batch of Piglet Willie's delicious Red Onion Marmalade.