onion sets

[texeltom]

been very droughty here and it's took its toll on quite a few of the sturon.more than usual have run to seed as soon as we got a splash of rain.as for the red baronthey are normally fickle for bolting at the best of times but this year is record breaking lol.
tom

[johnmichael]

Given up onion growing,cheep to buy and taste the same.

[vegetable-gardener]

One of the reason we started planting onions in the Autumn. They get a longer growing season and not many go to seed. Our next door neighbour planted the onions in Feb or March and loads of them have gone to seed. The best thing is to take the 'devil head' off and they should still grow. And don't forget to water them in dry weather.

[texeltom]

Originally Posted by vegetable-gardener

One of the reason we started planting onions in the Autumn. They get a longer growing season and not many go to seed. Our next door neighbour planted the onions in Feb or March and loads of them have gone to seed. The best thing is to take the 'devil head' off and they should still grow. And don't forget to water them in dry weather.

they dont i'm afraid,once seeded they are just fit for the compost bin.

[vegetable-gardener]

Ours are very large and some of these have seeded - we are eating these as the onion is very large. There's just a little hard bit in the middle where the seed bit was and we toss that out.

I suppose if the onion set is very small it won't come to nothing.

[Lesley Jay]

Hi VG, I must agree with you as I have always removed the flower stalks and used those onions for cooking immediately - it seems such a shame not to make the most of them! Heat treated sets cost more but the heat treatment kills the flower embryos and so these are less likely to 'run to seed'.

[Nicola_D]

Ah, loads of mine have gone to seed too. I'll pull them up then and see what the onion is like. I get my sturton from the pound shop and thens some other variety from a garden centre and they were about £3/4 a bag. I had some sets left over, can I plant these to over winter them? And if so when should I plant them?