Amish Yellow Bottle Onions

[Tormato]

The seeds had about 25% germination, but that is still plenty of seedlings, for me.

One mistake that I may have made is the planting time. I generally reference when to plant something by the week of a month (1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th), rather than the start of, or middle of, a month.

I had the bottle onions written down as the 2nd week of June rather than the middle of June. So, I started them on the 8th. I'll now write down 3rd week and middle of the month for the bottle onions.

As for the bulbs, they appear to behave like the round type of potato onions, where the largest bulbs planted will produce many small bulbs, and the small bulbs planted will produce one very large bulb (desired for the kitchen). I gave some away in the swap (unknowingly, likely the choicest-sized ones of about 1/4" in diameter). I planted 11, with 7-8 surviving. The tiniest ones, about 1/8" in diameter, are the ones that died or are currently struggling to survive. The very large ones are producing large healthy clusters. I don't even know if I have any of the "right-sized" ones planted, in order to harvest some large bottle onions.

My main goal this year is just gathering seeds, lots of seeds. Then the plan would be to freeze half of the seeds for use in 2026, and the other half of the seeds for next year.

[JRinPA]

Yeah I gotta find the last of that 2022 seed and get it planted.

So you do have some seed clusters on, very good.

[Tormato]

Yeah I gotta find the last of that 2022 seed and get it planted.

So you do have some seed clusters on, very good.

Nothing, yet.

I do have flowering on some bunching onions/scallions, and bulbils forming on the Egyptian walking onions.

And, as I'm going through everything that I have in veggie/fruit/flower seeds, for direct sowing, I found one more bottle onion bulb (I spilled all of them earlier this year) among one container of seeds. It has already sprouted green tops, and will be planted today.

[JRinPA]

So back in April the rain gutter grow bucket on the left got the six biggest bulbs I had left to try for seed. The next bucket got six med/lg. I have 4 big seed heads and 1 late/small seedhead formed and about ready in the left bucket. None in the second string med/lg bucket, so to get a bolt going, planting should be earlier still I guess. I was expecting all 12 of them to go to seed.

I pulled all the non-bolters today, they had fallen over, only the seed head onions hadn't fallen. From the first/left bucket, where the biggest bulbs went in, I got three sets of twins, two bottle onions touching at the root plate. No twins in the med/lg bucket.

The three buckets I seeded for sets around June 18?, seemed to do okay in the terrible hot and dry. I wetted once a day and kept a coroplast cover pinned most of the way across the rim. So a little air at the edges. I felt I had to remove the covers though as after the seed sprouted pretty well and the leaves needed light; once removed, sprouting ceased. Now it looks like I have lost some of the seed, seems like there were more last week. Very hot for this stuff.

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[JRinPA]

The 20ft raised bed caught the late spring start bottle onion transplants and the remainder of the sets. It was doing okay until I tried to cover it to protect against ALM. It got dry, my water was not hooked up, and the cover was breaking the onion leaves. Turned into a mess. Many of the too late started tranplants, as well as smallest sets, were gone when the cover came off. I did get some decent size bottle onions from the medium sets. The small sets mostly died off with the terrible growing conditions. This spring was dry and this bed accentuates the dry. Just had not other place to try it.

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This planting had been the full width of the bed, all the way down to the plastic. Spaced 4" in row, 10-12" between rows. So it was about 120 total. I harvested a whole lot less than that.

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This is most all the bottle onions I ended up with. There are 5 more with seed heads. Not a whole lot of weight to them for all the work.

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I like the idea. I haven't eaten any to speak of, so I can't comment on taste. I thought the sets and bulbs stored pretty well from last September to January, just in the cellarway. I would like to see how January seed starts work, the bottle onion seed starts for transplant weren't until March for me this year.

[Tormato]

Some failure is likely the best outcome for us. We need to learn best practices, from such failure. I didn't have enough bulbs of various sizes to observe what is going on with each of those sizes.

While they are much different, overall, than regular (round) multiplier onions, there are likely some similar characteristics between them. I know that with the multipliers, the largest bulbs, when planted, will produce large clusters of small bulbs, and the small bulbs, when planted will produce one large bulb. I don't yet know what an in-between sized bulb, when planted, will produce (those, currently, get eaten).

I have a few red, white and yellow multipliers growing this year, mostly from large bulbs. For an edible allium, the plant clusters are massive in size. I should go out there and count the number of clusters from each planted bulb. And perhaps next year, weighing bulbs before planting, and recording all planting info, will help me.

[ponyexpress]

Not a whole lot of weight to them for all the work.

I like the idea. I haven't eaten any to speak of, so I can't comment on taste. I thought the sets and bulbs stored pretty well from last September to January, just in the cellarway. I would like to see how January seed starts work, the bottle onion seed starts for transplant weren't until March for me this year.

I agree that it's been a lot of work for the amount of production you get. In fairness to the onions, I'm growing them at my house which is not full sun. I think next year, I will plant some in my community garden plot since there are no trees to block sun. I'll continue to grow the seed onions at my house in order to ensure proper pollination. At the community garden, there are too many people who have onions that gone to seed.

I have grown full sized onions from seed when I started them in January. That works.

So far, I haven't been happy with the size of my onion sets that I start from seed. This year's sets look to be on the small side again. I started them June 1st. Wondering if I should start them earlier?

Have a bunch of seed heads on the large onions that I will harvest for seed.

[JRinPA]

I guess these bottle onions might be a lot different than "regular" onions but I'm not familiar enough yet to see the differences. I apologize if I am confusing the thread. Just trying to provide data that has been gathered here in SE PA.

Last year was my first sets (dates planted are in the thread, I can't recall exact but early June late June) but I had figured from the first year results that mid June was good for me. But then this year, so much different weather, hot and dry. The spec I think was 1/4" was the perfect size? 1/4"diameter at max? or the root? I assumed 1/4" was measured at the center of the set, it's widest point. It will be a learning process for sure. From what I saw of the results of this 2024 harvest, a set's width at center of 3/8" to 1/2" should be my goal for set production. So I should have started this year's set production at Jun 10th. But again, this harvest was...suboptimal at best and only the first iteration. But a lot of the 1/4" sets dried up, there were sprouts in mid April but withered and gone by end of May cover removal.

If I can go from seed only and avoid having to grow and store sets...I'd probably like that schedule better than stressing about planting for sets in June. Just need to save a few good bulbs each year to replant for seed production... I'm thinking mid-March plant out of last year's bulbs. I had covered those pots with AG19, and I don't recall any damage from ALM. So I guess I could do that. But it is tough for me to have those pots ready that early. This year it didn't freeze after...mid/late March? I'd (roughly guess) this spring was 90th percentile for warm and 80th percentile for dry. Last year it was a late May freeze.

It is very early in my onion career but I'm super impressed by the vigor and size of the onions that I got started from seed around Feb 1. Buying yellow onion sets is cheap and easy in March but the results at this time are not nearly as impressive production, last year or this year. Both times I planted the sets directly into the ground in mid April. I've read you can make them bigger starting the sets in pots in a cold frame, but I would expect them to possibly bolt then...I like the guarantee that an onion seed started in Jan or Feb won't possibly (as I understand it) go to seed.

I should have a proper small poly greenhouse next year, with plenty of space for starts. It's on the carport for a month, still in the boxes.

[Tormato]

My thoughts are that if someone really has the room, to plant 1/3 of seeds, sets, etc.. wait a week and plant another 1/3, wait one more week and plant the last 1/3. While they are likely very daylight sensitive to forming bulbs, another key factor is likely degree days, which can vary from year to year.

A timely post the other day had me checking on my plants from bulbs/sets, today. Today my large plants are falling over. They are still 100% green, and one of them has the main stem kinked. Do I assume that they are almost ready to be dug? Like garlic, is it best to dig them when the soil is dry?

With the red, white and yellow round multiplier onions, they are producing from 4 to 8 stalks, from each large bulb planted. The soil is now being pushed up and out, so bulbs must be forming.

I'll should be offering them on a very limited basis later in the year.

And, I have harvested and winnowed seeds from 2 likely different unknown green onion/scallions varieties, one on June 15th, the other on June 25th. I have a 3rd unknown green onion/scallion variety where seeds will likely be harvested very soon. I have lots of seeds of these.

Finally, there will likely be a small amount of Egyptian walking onion bulbils. I'll have to search for the person who requested them last December. I'm reestablishing a bed of these. I had about 300 plants at one time, and am currently down to about 10.

[JRinPA]

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So one month after pulling, 5 of those nice big bottle onions have rotted while drying on the carport.

[Tormato]

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So one month after pulling, 5 of those nice big bottle onions have rotted while drying on the carport.

What was the temp on the carport? How long did you leave the trimmed off necks?
Like most bulbs in the allium family, I also trim the roots very short for storage.

[JRinPA]

I didn't trim them yet...the temp is outside temp, but shaded. I don't have a good place to store onions. I had decided it was long enough and went to gather them to store in the basement, and 5 are goo.
I think it was those bugs...

[JRinPA]

My cellarway stored bottle onions are sprouting already. Some of them. I'm not sure how to store these things.