Rather than starting onions from seed this year, I’ve decided to plant onion bulbs. It is quicker, easier, and while it is a tiny bit more expensive upfront, I think if I factored in my time and the cost to run the grow light, the difference would be negligible.
This time around I am planting both red and yellow onions.
How to Plant Onion Bulbs
You can direct sow onion bulbs in early spring, as soon as your nighttime temperatures stay above 20 degrees. To plant them, plant about 1″ deep and space them 5″ apart. As the bulb {onion} grows, the top portion of it will be out of the soil. Resist the urge to cover it, you want it to emerge from the top of the soil for best growth.
Onions do best in cooler weather, so mulch them well once warm/hot weather sets in. Water them fairly regularly, but be careful not to over-water, unless you are into rotten, mushy onions.
How to Harvest Onions
Onions are ready to harvest when their tops fall over. To harvest, gently loosen the soil around the base of the onion and lift it out of the dirt. I like to leave my onions on the top of the soil for a couple of days to allow them cure in the sun. Make sure they don’t get wet during the curing process by keeping them out of the path of any sprinklers. If rain is in the forecast, you may want to cure them in the garage.
After they have dried, you can remove any roots, clip the stems so that you have about 1″ of the neck, and store them like the good little squirrel that you are.
How do you prefer to start your onions? From seed or bulbs?
~Mavis
Megan says
Thank you so much for this. I just got my onion bulbs in the mail, this is my first time growing them!!
Ann says
Onion bulbs would always flower and go to seed for me. After several seasons of frustration, I started growing them from seed. Now, they don’t flower – and I can try all sorts of different varieties! My current favorite is an open-pollinated storage onion from Baker Creek called Yellow of Parma. I’m glad bulbs work for you in that wonderfully cool Pacific climate. Thanks for the tips, Mavis.
Ginger says
I do the Yellow of Parmas too! Cool. But some years I plant bulbs anyhow, cause in WI we just don’t have a real long season!
Erin says
Wow. I am just trying to grow onions from seed for the first time this year. I bought Yellow of Parma, and also Redport South Globe onion. I’ve read that the resulting onion from seed is larger and “better” than that grown from sets. I’m excited for the garden this year, for sure!
Kathy says
I have perennial onions in my onion bed. They are called Egyptian Walking Onions. They are green year round and you can go out in the middle of winter and pull green onions. The bulbs do not get real big but if you like pickling onions or cocktail onions, they are perfect for that. They will even plant themselves if you forget or ignore them. They are topsetting and will make “babies” on the end of their long green stems and they will fall over and take root where they fall if you don’t pull them and plant them yourself. I’ve had them for six years here and at the house I had before I moved here. I love them.
Mrs. C. says
I planted those for the first time last fall and I am excited to see how ey do.
joan says
We have better luck with seed. Our bulbs always bolt to early.
Phyl says
Buy enough bulbs so that you can save a few until mid summer when you can plant a second crop for fall. As long as they don’t freeze, mulched onions are quite hardy. In mid summer positively no nursery will have onion bulbs available for purchase. This is also a good hedge against a crop failure as it will allow you to get in a second crop.
Phyllis says
Be sure to buy a few extra bulbs now while you can still get them. That way when you have some space in your garden in the middle of the summer, like after you harvest lettuce, you can plant a second crop. Onions are quite hearty if mulched heavily.
Kathy says
When I used to buy onion bulbs (before I planted the perennial onions), I used to get extra, keep them wrapped in a plastic bag (not closed up like a Ziplock bag but a regular shopping bag) and store them in the crisper of the refrigerator. I would plant bulbs at intervals all summer long for continuous green onions.
Rams says
How are your onions doing? i planted about 80 bulbs and only 1/3 of them actually are growing. They are already almost a foot tall and the rest are not even popping up. I am so disappointed.
Mavis Butterfield says
Our onions are doing well, I’d say 95% of them came up. I’m not sure why yours did not. Were they old onion bulbs? Small perhaps?