Onion Problems?

[mommagoose_99]

Has anyone noticed any problems with their onions this year? Aguy down the road got someone in to look at his and they have some sort of disease. It has been very wet and cool this year and my onions do not seem to be bulbing up very well. The ones I have pulled have a thick outer shell that is too tough to eat. What is happening to my 9300 onion plants? They are about 3 weeks behind in growth.
Linda

[ChristieAcres]

Here in the PNW, Zone 8b, we have also had strange weather... Late Spring, record hot dry temps, lack of rain, now unseasonably cool (yesterday 64). I have no idea how that is going to effect the outcomes of all the vegetables. My onions are fine, so is the garlic. I am feeding the Swiss Chard to the rabbits & chickens today & replanting it (did terrible). The first peas were stringy and tough (Sugar Snap Peas), but all those afterward were fine (?!). Here, I plant my Onions in the Fall, and just let them overwinter. I am growing Walla Walla's, Purple, and Egyptian Walking Onions. The Egyptians didn't do well over the first part of the growing season and have now rebounded and are putting on a lot of growth. Strange year for gardening everywhere it seems!

[steff bugielski]

My onions are terrific. I got from Dixondale and planted in very rich soil covered in 6 inches of hay. They are huge . I have been pulling about 5-10 everyday to sell and saviing the best to keep. I have been eating them for a few weeks and they are tender and delicious.
Most every thing else this year has been terrible. No cukes yet no zucchini yet tomatoes still green and the third try at beans are just getting flowers. So thank heaven for beets, swiss chard, kale and onions.

[mommagoose_99]

My cucumbers were late but our harvest is in full swing sold about 50 bushel so far. We picked 5 bushel between rain showers yesterday and another 6 bushel tonight. Thank goodness for green thermally opaic plastic!!! We really needed the extra heat this year.
We are on our second planting of Zucchini. Picked 1 quart of ripe tomatoes yesterday but the plants have late blight.. We picked 3 bushels of Romano beans last week. I have flowers on the wax beans and shell beans and my green filet beans need picking.
Linda

[Paquebot]

No onion problems here and we've just had the coldest July on record. In fact, just commented this afternoon that everyone's onions are at least 10% bigger than should be expected. A friend had planted a lot of red onions from sets. They were just starting to flop and he asked me if they were going to get any bigger. My reply was that they were already much bigger than I would expect. Another planted a quart of ordinary yellow sets. Yesterday he asked if someone didn't goof and substitute another variety as there are a lot of 4" bulbs. They are simply loving the cool nights which extend their growing season.

Martin

[cowboy joe]

Originally Posted by mommagoose_99

We are on our second planting of Zucchini.
Linda

LOL, producing only for myself as opposed to producing for market, hard to imagine a second planting with so many from the first four plants!

Onions didn't fair well at my place this year. Only about half of what I pulled were any good. Lots of rain & cool weather here also. The cukes & tomatoes were planted in late early May & are just beginning to bear. Hoping for a late frost...

[catmar]

My onions here are small, it still is very wet here. Temp might get up to 80 today.
Garlic did not do well either. Cukes never even grew, spring too cold & wet.
Tomatoes all but 2 have blight, Tore them out of the garden last week. I wont we saving any of those seeds.
Beans are doing great, so are the carrots.
Going to be planting more cole crops next week, I love fresh brussel sprouts!!
Cathy

[Danaus29]

My onions are small but they are White Bunching Lisbon, not supposed to bulb up. They were left from last year and have done fantastic. Hot but beautiful and multiplying.

The sets I got didn't do so well but that was my fault. I fully expected the lettuce and peas that I planted them among to be long gone before the onions were supposed to bulb up. Instead the lettuce spread out wildly (the bunnies didn't eat the outer leaves, just the head) and the peas just kept going. The poor onions didn't get enough sun. I know better next year. Just put the onions in their own bed and mulch like crazy.

[manygoatsnmore]

Most of the onions I planted this year grew seed heads! Not just the sets, which always seem to have some that go to seed rather than bulbing up, but even my Walla Walla Sweet PLANTS went to seed. Also had some bug damage to some of the bulbs, which I don't usually see. I did get quite a lot of good onions, but it was a bumper year for seed saving. Guess I'll see what I get next year from those seeds.

[mommagoose_99]

For Friday and Saturday's Market I pulled 2 bushels of Red Zeppalin and 2 bushels of Candy's . They looked great although the stems are full of water from the 4 inches of rain last Saturday. I am going to pull the rest of both rows of onions and spread them out to dry. I would question whether they will store well with so much water in them. I have 9 more rows of onions to process. Martin would you guess I should pull all of them asap? I think maybe I should. The tops have not tipped yet but they are full of water.
Linda

[ladytoysdream]

This last heavy rainstorm we had, hubby made the decision to pull all our onions. Reds and white did good. The yellow ones had the outside layer starting to be too wet/soft. I have already processed all but some of the reds. Our head count was just over 200 onions which is lot for just the two of us, and our first year growing onions. Now we are having a hot spell of temps. Crazy summer weather. It was cool and too much rain for quite awhile here.

Our tomatoes are coming along good. Glad now I put in 50 plants where last year we only had 9 plants. The sister in law and another friend both lost all their tomatoes to the blight. Good thing I have extra to share this year.

[mamagoose]

Most of our onions are huge this year and the tops have mostly died back now. I planted a few hundred from seed and put them out very early.