Friday, February 4, 2011

Forgotten Onions

We grow some store-bought onions which sprouted some shoots end of winter last year. Not me, but Ilhan and Mik who planted those onions and I am only playing a role as the harvester this time. The onion grow without any TLC and were neglected most of the time at the other side of our backyard fence. The weather had been extremely hot last week and I have not been at the other side of the fence for 2 weeks. The weather was a bit cool in the afternoon and I decided to venture at the other side of the fence. Opps, most of them had been completely dried and wilted.

I had harvested some a few weeks ago. However, today I harvested all of them.

Some of the onions don't need curing, the only one which has green colour leaves on it were left curing under the shed.
The only onion left growing in the garden is the Australian Brown onion which we grow from seeds. My mother has been helping me harvested the ones which have leaves that had completely turn brownish (dried) from the polystyrene containers. As I was busy being a research student, the onions has been in the bottom list of priority things to do in the garden.

Ilhan with his single layer onion that he planted mimmicking his favourite monster book 'Gruffulo". We had some onions which only have one leaves on it. For an onion, the number of leaves will determine the number of layer inside the onion.
 I had fun growing allium last winter. I don't have to worry about pest and watering for them. They are a very independent bunch. It will be fun to try growing early variety onion in autumn to get the supply going as I don't know how long this new harvest will last us. I hope this year, I can get some supply for shallots to grow in our garden.

16 comments:

Anonymous said...

It is very nice onion harvest. As I can see, they are pretty good in size, considering they were forgotten.
I have just started some of my onion seeds. But my onions in storage from last year will not last long. So for this season I will have to grow double the amount of the onions than last year.

p3chandan said...

Not a bad harvest Diana although they were neglected and left to dry.

Mr. H. said...

I hope you are able to grow shallots, I have never had much luck with them for some reason but hope to try again this year. Enjoy those onions, looks like a pretty good harvest to me and I like how you hang them to cure.

One said...

Your son is really cute!!! Long horns!

ROUGH.ROSA said...

Never thought growing onions would be that much of fun, especially to your son! I can see him enjoying his garden creation in a very 'creative' way... My kids had tried their hands on growing beans and kangkung... they were delighted to see them sprouting and asked me for days to cook them right away..Emm.. may be onions next! Thanks for the idea!

ROUGH.ROSA said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Sue Garrett said...

You do well growin on shop bought things don't you?

~TastyTravels~ said...

You have a very adorable garden monster! Heehee! How cute! Nice onions! I hope my batch turns out!

Unknown said...

I will try to grow my onions in a polystyrene containers, like you.

Eliza @ Appalachian Feet said...

Haha! I don't know Gruffalo but your son's monster is anything but scary -- he's just too cute!

I meant to email you too (I replied to one of your earlier comments) but I think I live too far away for customs to allow me to receive seeds from you. I hope you can find someone else to send them to. I really appreciate the wonderful offer, though and your seed week idea was fantastic. I'm glad it was so successful.

rainfield61 said...

A good harvest that grows on a head.

LOL.

Malay-Kadazan girl said...

Vrtlarica ana~ It is never enough with onions isn't it. Most of the dish uses onion as the basic ingredient for us. I posted some red onion (odourless) seed that we harvested end of November to you, hope it will help to give you more onion supply this year.

p3chandan~ Lucky the ones that were neglected were doing fine own their own. But I have a bad year with sweet corn. I regret trying hybrid this year should have stick with last year variety.

Mr. H~ Actually the way I am curing were similar like yours because when I was enjoying reading your blog about your previous harvest somehow seeing the onions hanging left it imprinted in my mind. Since I don't have that much space and no racks, hanging the onions for curing is suitable for us. I hope I can find some shallots to grow, we can't even order onions interstate.

One~ Remind me of "seladang" horns.

ROUGH.ROSA~ Growing their own vegetables will make it easier for them to like vegetables (I mean easier for us). Onion sets well be easy for children to hold on their hand and plant them.

Sue~ It was just a beginners luck for us. Since potato and onion were our first experiment.

Holly~ I am looking forward to see your walla walla progress.

Ellada~ It will be an interesting trial. My error was not enough drainage. Onion do hate wet feet.

Eliza~Sorry to hear that. Thank you for making seed week successful.

Rainfield61~ LOL.

J.C. said...

I only grow spring onions in my garden. So, I find it very fascinating to grow onion bulbs!! That's a lot of harvest to me! Happy gardening.

Malay-Kadazan girl said...

J.C.~ It takes about 6 months to grow onion from sets. It will be another 4-5 months when we can start grow onion again. So I hope the onions can keep long.

Malar said...

That's handful of onions!
Your son looks so cute!

miruku said...

Neglected but still giving you so much to harvest! I grow onion for the leaves only, very sayang to dig them up lah!