spring onion

[pip1954]

hi all
how has your spring onions been this year, last year i grew loads without any problems but this year they are realy small,
any tips at what i could do to make them bigger next year,
or is it just a bad year this year for them.
how do you grow yours and where ,
ie outside /inside raised bed /normal bed ?

[glass half full]

Have you manured the onion plots before sowing/ planting sets? It seems to be better, in my experience.
I also have had stronger crops by starting seeds in trays of compost and transplanting them.
The beauty (frustration?) of gardening is that results are often never the same from year to year but we still love trying, don't we?
Good luck with efforts for 2009-10

[Two_Sheds]

Tell you what I learned this year (from Piglet and Zazen) : onions do better if you start them off, then uproot and replant them. It seems to stimulate growth.

I sowed some White Lisbon direct about 9 months ago ... they are still sitting in the ground, hardly having grown at all.
The ones I did in cell trays and transplanted, were fabulous. http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...etc_25527.html

[zazen999]

AT LAST!!!!!


Sorry Two-Sheds - but people don't believe me when I tell them this

See Piglet Willie's blog for the best way of growing spring onions......

[sarraceniac]

They also like carbon. I remember that in the days of coal fires, gardeners used to actively seek out sources of soot to put it on and in the onion patch. Alas few people have access to an open chimney nowadays but I'm lucky, I have a neighbour who still uses coal and she doesn't grow onions so I get her soot. It is great when the sweep comes because he is quite happy to empty his vacuum cleaner in my garden. (What happened to the fellows with the big flat brushes that used to go round kissing brides for ten bob a time? )