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Farm Friday, August 16th, 2024
When everything goes right
Is this the best onion harvest ever? Top three for sure.
Onions are an unforgiving crop. There are dozens of ways for an onion crop to do poorly. I have seen them all. In order to succeed I have to thread the needle.
We need to start the seeds in early March so the plants have enough time to size up. We need to buy the best seeds for our latitude that can take advantage of our long days. We need to transplant them in early May into fertilized beds and keep them weeded and watered. That means an inch of rain or irrigation a week and a close weeding every two weeks.
The onion crop failed from drought last year, despite our best efforts at irrigation. Three years ago, we went out to harvest and two-thirds of the onions were rotten from too much rain at harvest time. Other years we turned our backs and lost them to the weeds. I remember the year thrips were an issue. And I can’t forget the year we got hail that damaged all the onions irrevocably. If it is not one thing it is another.
This year, everything worked out. We had a small planting window in the rainy Spring and we hit it. Then I was rigorous with weeding. We hoed every row four times until early July when we let them fend for themselves. We irrigated a few times but mostly had good rains…
