Help!!

I bought some red onion sets and planted them a couple of months a go and they were going great. Now I have noticed they have flower buds at the top of one of the stalks. Have they bolted or is this natural?

Never grown these onions before so not sure what to expect.

Any advice greatly received!

Thanks!

On Thu, 10 Jun 2004 05:58:13 UTC, bluebubble30
opined:
Help!!

I bought some red onion sets and planted them a couple of months a goand they were going great. Now I have noticed they have flower buds atthe top of one of the stalks. Have they bolted or is this natural?

Never grown these onions before so not sure what to expect.

Any advice greatly received!

That's what onions do. They are not bolting. Snip off the buds, however, and
put them in the wok (call them "Lily Buds"). You don't need them to put
their effort into making seeds.

--
Stan Goodman
Qiryat Tiv'on
Israel

Saddam is gone. Ceterum, censeo Arafat esse delendum.

To send me email, please replace the CAPITAL_LETTERS with "sig". Please do
not send me HTML-formatted messages.Please do not send me attachments
without telling me beforehand.

"Stan Goodman" wrote:

On Thu, 10 Jun 2004 05:58:13 UTC, bluebubble30
opined:
Help!!

I bought some red onion sets and planted them a couple of months a goand they were going great. Now I have noticed they have flower buds atthe top of one of the stalks. Have they bolted or is this natural?

Never grown these onions before so not sure what to expect.

Any advice greatly received!

That's what onions do. They are not bolting. Snip off the buds, however, and
put them in the wok (call them "Lily Buds"). You don't need them to put
their effort into making seeds.


Unfortunately, while that's true for garlic, it is not true for
onions. Onions are biennial and, if the onion sets were too big when
harvested they think they've finished their first year. When they're
planted again they think they are in their second year and send up a
flower stalk. Once an onion sends up a flower stalk, you might as well
pull the onion and use it; it will not continue to grow larger nor
will it store well.
Leave any that haven't sent up a flower stalk, they will continue to
grow. Any that have sent up a flower stalk are on an unstoppable
downhill slide as far as being edible. You could always let them
mature and save the seeds. In most cases, growing onions from seed
produces far more satisfactory results and onions grown from seed will
store much better than those grown from sets.
Ross,
Ontario, Canada.
New AgCanada Zone 5b
43º19' North
80º16' West

Ross Reid wrote:
"Stan Goodman" wrote:


On Thu, 10 Jun 2004 05:58:13 UTC, bluebubble30
opined:

Help!!

I bought some red onion sets and planted them a couple of months a goand they were going great. Now I have noticed they have flower buds atthe top of one of the stalks. Have they bolted or is this natural?

Never grown these onions before so not sure what to expect.

Any advice greatly received!

That's what onions do. They are not bolting. Snip off the buds, however, and
put them in the wok (call them "Lily Buds"). You don't need them to put
their effort into making seeds.



Unfortunately, while that's true for garlic, it is not true for
onions. Onions are biennial and, if the onion sets were too big when
harvested they think they've finished their first year. When they're
planted again they think they are in their second year and send up a
flower stalk.

This could happen also in the first year if the onions has been exposed
to cold conditions.
--



--------------------------------------------------------------
Nick Apostolakis
e-mail:
Web Site: http://agriroot.aua.gr/~nickapos
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