Sunday, September 30, 2012

Spring Onion Life Cycle

  Spring onion or the salad onion taste milder than other onion. Its hollow leaves finely chop and top on fried rice/noodles, porridge or other dishes making it more appealing. Not just making dishes appealing or decorative but add more nutrition good for the health no doubt. My children and I prefer spring onion that does not produce bulb unlike onions or shallots leaves for toppings because it has mild taste and not hot.
 Last year autumn, we transplanted some spring onion seedling under sunflower plants to make the garden more productive. Those spring onion does not seem to mind sitting under the sunflower because it still received direct light from the sun in the morning. We also had a row of carrots growing in front of the spring onion plants.
Spring onion does not need to be harvest whole, can be treated as come and cut again plant. My husband uses a lot of spring onion to cook especially when he makes misoshiru (miso soup). He is the Japanese chef in the family. My sons like prawn and spring onion toast. We had surplus spring onion and when spring came last year our spring onion goes to produce seeds. Bees really like the spring onion flower, there are always hovering around the plant at the moment.
Spring onion is surprisingly drought-hardy when well-established. We left them growing with neglect on the patch and the plants still live till today forgotten. Interestingly, this spring those spring onion plants starts to flower again producing seeds. Furthermore, the flower are much bigger compared to previous year when it flowers for the first time. Spring onion are biennial plant. So I thought when the plant has produce seeds on its second year (last year spring), it will eventually dies. But spring onion continue evergreen growing and surprisingly producing seeds again this year. The spring onion flowers in its second spring are more well pollinated as we harvest more seeds this year and the quality of the seeds looks much better compared to last spring.
This is how our flowering spring onion plants in its second spring season looks at the moment. Last spring, we planted a chilli plant in between these spring onion plants and we had no encounter or problem with pest on this chilli plant. This over-wintered chilli plant survived and will need a little bit of hair cut getting rid of old-leaves as it has already start to sprout new baby leaves and looks really disheveled at the moment.
The dried pods opening up and pop goes the seeds.

Have a nice weekend gardening!

18 comments:

Sunray Gardens said...

I actually like the bloom head. I think those in the onion family are very cool looking.
Cher Sunray Gardens

Umm AA said...

Yang nie tanam from seed yer? ayg kat bhg root dia mcm bulat putih sikit tu yer, tp tak btk mcm bwg kan?spring onion tuh kalau hiris buat hiasan atas mee goreng atau sup pun sedapkan..

tina said...

I like the flowers on spring onion. I usually cut them when dried and display them in the house. How nice to have a chef in the family.

rainfield61 said...

Have not seen a flower on onion.

That looks interesting and beautiful.

Daphne Gould said...

I let mine bloom in the garden this year. I love the pretty flowerheads. And the bees just loved the flower.

wani sc said...

cantik ye bunga spring onion. saya punya tanam dari bawang kat dapur je. huhu. lambat tak dia bercambah dari benih?

olive said...

i grow spring onion using bulb. will it give me flower & seeds too? I have never see onion seed in msia

Sue Garrett said...

For some reason over the last few years spring onions just refuse to grow for us. Others on our site have commented on the same thing. I'm not sure what the reason is as last year was so dry and this year so wet that the conditions have been very different and we still have had the same problem. WE have even tried growing in pots on compost - no joy!

veggiegobbler said...

I'm growing spring onion for the first time this year. I didn't think of treating it as a cut and go plant- will try that. Also will look forwardvto seeingbthe flower.

admin said...

mcmana saya tersesat di kebun orang ni? tolongggg [lol]

baguznet said...

The leaves and the flowers look very nice... really like it

Wendy said...

that prawn/spring onion toast looks delicious!

Liz said...

Nice round up on Spring Onions - I tend to harvest mine rather than cut & come again, although I do that too. Mine are starting to send up their flower shoots and I'm looking forward to saving seed as its getting expensive buying it all the time. Glad your chilli overwintered some of mine seem to have done better than others. My scotch bonnets survived and have put on new growth but none of the others have yet.

cikmanggis said...

Spring onion yang Cm tanam tak sempat berbunga sebab selalu di gongdolkan..selalu masak sup.nanti nak biarkan hingga berbunga nak lihat bagaimana rupanya..

petite nyonya said...

wow, yr spring onions are so gemuk and healthy!! first time i'm seeing the flowers. don't know why mine can never survive as cut and grow again. it's always 1 time harvest n they're gone.

Kate said...

Onions are so pretty in flower gardens!

Malay-Kadazan girl said...

Cher~ Onion family flower are very cool looking the ornamental ones are more so and big.

Ummuaidan~Yang ni tanam from seed. Bawah putih tapi tak jadi bulb bawang. Sedap buat dressing macam ketumbar.

Tina~Oh I have never cut them for display, I should do that.

Rainfield61~The flower bud sometime looks like dome before it open and bloom.

Daphne~The bees go crazy on the allium flower.

Wani SC~Spring onion average cambah 2-3minggu juga.

Olive~If you don't cut the leaves and let it grow normally without disturbing it might flower. But some onion are sensitive to day-length to trigger flowering. It takes quite some time for them to produce flower.

Malay-Kadazan girl said...

Sue~ When I started gardening it was easy to germinate spring onions and then it gets harder each season. I wonder why too.In your case, its a mystery hopefully solve soon.

Veggieglobber~Yes you can treat them as cut and go.

Donny len~Nak minta tolong kemaskan kebun ni...hehehe...

Baguznet~Like pom pom.

Wendy~I can eat many with that toast.

Liz~We use to buy spring onion seeds each year too. Now we save the seeds like kailan, radish and other Asian greens. As we grow them a lot. The only tricky things with brassica is just to make sure let only one species flower at a time as they cross-pollinate so easily. Chilli make a quick start with new growth compare to capsicum in our garden.

Cikmanggis~Kalau selalu digondolkan memang tak jadi nak berbunga. Nak tunggu berbunga pun lama juga. Saya punya setahun sekali je nak bunga.

Petite Nyonya~Did you cut too many leaves? Need to have a few leaves left on the plant.

Kate~Yeah and easy to take care too. Not many pest.