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Vegetable Gardening

onion sets flowering year early

16 years ago

Hello, I bought onion sets from Territorial seeds this spring and planted them early (probably around early April). They grew fantastic and have started getting nice and large and we have been able to start pulling some for green onions and small bulbs.

My problem is that over half of the plants have started to form seed heads on their stalks. They shouldn't do that until next spring, correct?

When I emailed Territorial all they said was "some sort of environmental condition" must have made the onions think they were in their second season. WHAT??? We had 3 days in mid april that it got to freezing but other than that the weather has been perfect spring/summer weather.

Could 3 days of colder weather have "tricked" the onions?

The onions were Day Neutral varieties and I can't help but wonder how any onion farmer gets any crop at all if the onions are that easily tricked...:)

Any thoughts?

kendra

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Comments (5)

jbann23
16 years ago
Onion sets are already into the second year as the onion is a biennial. Naturally, they will flower especially if exposed to a freeze. It is said that cutting off the flower stalk will help but I've never tried this. Eat the flowering onions first since they don't store well.
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ardnek710
Original Author
16 years ago
hmmmm...I guess i just didn't understand what I had exactly. I know that once they flower the stop bulb production and I know that the bulb that is there will not store well, soooo I guess I got alot of green onion...:)

Oh well, good thing I like green onion also..:)

How do I avoid this next year? Do I plant from seed instead to ensure that the plants in the spring are not going to flower? Do I plant from seed in the fall or spring?

thanks
kendra
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I had sets in the ground from last year that did the same thing. I pulled them and used as green onions. I do however have one still in the ground beginning to bulb. It does have a flower but it is not huge yet like the others got. I planted sets this spring as well and so far so good no bolting. I hope they bulb up in July.
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You can try to trick them into bulbing a little bit more by breaking off the flower stalk but they probably won't get too much bigger. You can still use them though, just use them first because they won't keep very well. As far as planting a second set goes: you can plant them but they are daylight triggered to initiate bulbing (length of days). It depends on whether it's a short day or long day variety. If it's a long day variety because we're so close to the solstice, they'll probably never receive that trigger since days will be shortening by the time they're established so likely wouldn't initiate a bulb. If it's a short day variety AND you get lucky, they'll establish before the length of days drop below they're threshold and they'll start to bulb. The resulting bulbs are likely to be small though. Now, that said there is another option.. you can plant them and grow them intending to use them as green onions/scallions.
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I don't think your onions are giving up early, because bulbing and withering of tops is triggered by long days. Your opportunties to increase bulb size ended about a month ago, when the plants were actively growing. Now all you can do is pull and cure them. Bunching onions that get big eventually divide into a cluster.You can separate and replant them.
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Sure, you can force an onion to flower if you want. Keep in mind though that to get good quality seeds from onions you should have at least 20 plants to cross pollinate. Seems like a lot of work to me though, onion seeds are pretty cheap.
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digit
16 years ago
Kendra, I grow lots of onions from sets and seed. This year, I'm again growing a few from plants. It's all good.

Sets (dormant immature bulbs) are great for really early scallions. The varieties grown are also usually very suitable for allowing some of them to mature and then use out of storage. Yes, they are inclined to flower so keep an eye on the onion patch and harvest those with flower buds as scallions before going on to the others.

Onions from seed are a little hard to deal with because the seedlings are so small. I start them in the greenhouse and then transplant out of the flat into the garden. Transplanting early will help avoid shock but youÂre dealing with something the size of dog hairs . . .

Sowing seed directly in the garden works okay. Small onions are very vulnerable to weed competition and trying to get the weeds out without uprooting the tiny onions, is tuff.

Other vegetables also react to cold weather early in the season by curtailing their growth and flowering. There are "windows of opportunity" for planting and sometimes they are small and the Spring weather is unpredictable. More than one variety and seeding more than once can increase your chances for success. Also with onions, you've got sets, plants, and seed. Life is good.

Steve
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wayne_perrier
16 years ago
I've had good success by cutting off the flower stalks. Also I actually did let a few flower and saved the seeds, which did germinate the next year.
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fliptx
16 years ago
It's been a weird year for onions for me, too. I started some bunching onions from seed earlier this year and they've been flowering for a few weeks already. The ones I planted last year (same kind of onion, even) took almost a year to start flowering. Some of the onions I started from bulbs this spring are also flowering, although that surprises me less.
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