3 Indicators Your Onions Are Able to Harvest – Backyard Betty

In case you began your onions from seed greater than three months in the past or planted onion units within the spring, these onion bulbs are most likely bulging out of the soil and searching like they’re prepared for harvest… however are they?

Right here’s a enjoyable reality: you’ll be able to choose your onions proper now if you wish to. Onions might be harvested at any stage of progress and don’t have to succeed in a sure measurement earlier than they’re thought of harvestable.

In case you like the scale they’re at (even when they’re simply golf balls), go forward—pull up and eat your onions contemporary out of the bottom. Leaves which are nonetheless good and inexperienced might be cooked and eaten too (they style similar to scallions as a result of, effectively, they really are inexperienced onions).

The downside is that your onions might be smaller than in the event that they have been allowed to develop to maturity, and after they haven’t totally matured, they received’t retailer effectively in case your aim is to inventory the pantry for winter.

Methods to gauge maturity

You’ll know an onion is nearing maturity when you rely its leaves. Every leaf corresponds to at least one ring on the bulb. And the bigger and thicker the leaf, the bigger and thicker the ring.

(I wager you’ll all be working out to rely the leaves in your onions now! Or is that simply me?)

An onion transplant sometimes grows a pair of leaves each two weeks after getting established. Fortunate 13 is the “good” variety of leaves for a jumbo onion, so in case your plant already has this many leaves, it’s effectively on its strategy to maturity!

Not all onions produce 13 leaves nevertheless; some might high out at 9 to 12 leaves relying on the cultivar and rising circumstances. These vegetation will nonetheless produce stunning bulbs that maintain effectively, so don’t fear!

As quickly as all of the leaves have shaped, the plant transitions from leafy inexperienced progress to bulb enlargement. Begin protecting a detailed eye in your crop from mid-summer to late summer season when most onions are prepared to reap. You need to be sure to choose the onions on the proper time (not too early, not too late) to maximise storage potential. Do not look ahead to all of the leaves to show brown!

Right here’s what to search for:

1. A mushy neck

The “neck” is the place the leaves meet the bulb. When this space begins to really feel mushy, it means all of the vitality saved within the leaves has completed transferring to the bulb.

At this level, cut back watering to stop bitter pores and skin (a bacterial illness characterised by the outer layers of the bulb turning brown and slimy) and black mildew (which regularly occurs in very moist soil).

2. Tops flopping over

One other telltale signal that your onions are virtually prepared for harvest is when the tops begin to slouch on the neck. Because the bulb pulls sugars out of the leaves and moisture out of its roots, you’ll begin seeing leaves flip yellow and die again. Cease watering utterly whereas your crop finishes maturing over the subsequent week or two.

Usually, I look ahead to for not less than half to three-quarters of my onion crop to fall over earlier than I harvest. This ensures good pores and skin improvement to guard the bulb in storage.

In case you harvest earlier than the final leaf is dry, it’s extra vulnerable to rot throughout storage.

It is a easy course of that’s largely hands-off and I’ve obtained a full information right here on learn how to treatment your onions.