Vegmonkey and the Mrs.

Not only do the onions fill a winter gap where the soil would otherwise be unused, they fit perfectly into the rotation. Bed 1 (for want of a better name!) is the roots bed (houses carrots, parsnips, leeks and onions) which will become the Cucurbit bed next year. I don’t need the half being used by the onions until Late June/Early July, so the onions will sit happily. They will be replaced by a variety of squash, raised in pots and transplanted in later.

When i plant the standard onion sets next year, there will be no less than 200 onions sitting in a space no bigger than 2.5 square metres. Easy as that. Whoever said veg growing wasn’t easy

The most difficult job this winter, and incidentally, one of the most rewarding, is to (realistically) update the planting scheme, without overdoing it.

Has anyone had any bad experiences with Senshyu or other overwintering onions? I don’t mean muggings or bad attitudes! , but pests or problems. A bit of advance warning is never a bad thing.

We planted about 100 Senshyu onion sets in the space where the carrots and parsnips have recently come out. These are specially bred for overwintering, as they don’t mind the lack of sun that the short days of winter provide us with. They grow to about 45cm high, like all sets and should be planted between 7 and 15 cm apart depending on the size of onion you require (i like big ones!)

They will be ready to be harvested in June from a November sowing. When they come out the pre-grown cucurbits will go into the space in June.

Even though they don’t store as well as Spring planted sets, they will fill a gap that we need filling! If i remember rightly, we had about 30 onions from the spring sowing which lasted us from mid -August until mid-November. There are only two of us so it was by no means heavy use. We will need to sow twice that next year so a row of leeks and a row of parsnips may have to be discarded, and be replaced by onions.

The way i see it, by the time we have used all of the Autumn sown onions, the Spring ones will be ready to be used. Everyone needs onions! I think we’ll have some red ones come next year. Can anyone recommend any good varieties that are sold as sets? I think Radar is one.