Growing Onions from Seed

This page will provide written and visual instruction on growing onions from seed.

We will be planting the Candy (F1), (picture at right) onion sometime in September according to the lunar calendar. This onion is a widely adapted, mid-day variety. It is a slightly flattened yellow onion and has potential for large size, especially when sown for overwintering in its optimum 338-408 latitude range.

Days to Maturity: Approx 290 if late summer-sown and wintered over; 110 if spring-sown

The F1 means it is a hybrid.

A hybrid seed is produced by artificially cross-pollinated plants. Hybrids are bred to improve the characteristics of the resulting plants, such as better yield, greater uniformity, improved color, disease resistance, and so forth.

Hybrid seed cannot be saved, as the seed from the first generation of hybrid plants does not reliably produce true copies, therefore, new seed must be purchased for each planting.

So if you are considering producing your own seeds some day, make sure it is not a hybrid.

09-24-09

I planted my onion seeds by the lunar calendar. Then we got a lot of rain, cloudy days and some cool weather. The onions are coming up but not as quickly as I had hoped. I do thank God for the seven inches of rain we have gotten.

The best crops are grown in humus-rich sands, light loams, and high organic matter muck and peat soils. Onions from seeds or plants are generally better than set-grown onions.

Direct sow in April or early May or as soon as the soil can be prepared in early spring, sow in a 2" wide band, about 2 seeds/in., 1/4- 1/2" deep, rows 12-18" apart.

Thin to 1 1/2-2" apart for highest yields on fertile soil. Thin to 3-4" apart for larger onions and 4" apart for the "sweet mild" type.

Keep onions well weeded with shallow cultivation. Onions are shallow rooted and grow best with at least an inch per week of rain or irrigation.

When onions are mature and have started to develop skins and tops are falling over, pull and sun-cure at least a week before removing tops.

When dry, clip off tops and store in onion bags or shallow boxes at near freezing and 65-70% humidity.

Check more on onions by going to Growing Onions.

Update:

02-09-2010

In growing onions from seed I believe they have not done as well as I had hoped for the Fall/Winter of 2009/2010. However we have had a lot of cloudy days, rain and cold temps.

Plus my greenhouse has not gotten as much sun as I thought it would. But as the days are getting longer and Spring is in the air, they are growing better.

Below is a picture of them as well as a video of doing some thinning/transplanting.

A reader wrote in with this:

"I've just started a small greenhouse, so far my tomatoes and corn are doing good, I've transplanted them to bigger pots indoors. I also planted onions, but none of them seem to be growing instead they all seem to have this white fuzzy almost webby something growing out of them. Just wanted to know if you would have any idea as to what it is, and if you have any suggestions as to how to grow onions in an indoor greenhouse."

My reply:

Thank you for your email.

My onions have been doing OK so far. They have not grown as quickly as I had planned but that is probably due to the fact that my greenhouse does not get as much Winter sun as I though it would.

I am glad to hear that your plants are doing well. I would appreciate some pictures if you could send some. They can be sent to schulzedavid@msn.com.

It sounds like your onions may have a fungus of some sort caused by excess humidity in the greenhouse. A fan with a little ventilation would probably solve this problem.

Plus certain onions have to be grown at certain altitudes for best performance.

I hope this helps.

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