My new Veg growing diary website.

[vegmandan]

You too could easily grow some big Onions CHAR.

You just need to start off with the right plants.

That's why this year I'm "Hopefully" going to get seedlings from the World Record Holding variety.

OK, I know the better the soil and growing conditions,the better they grow,but If you buy a Genuine "Big" onion variety,whether it be seed or plant you'd be amazed how big they can grow even if you're not as obsessed as me.

Believe me you don't need to be gifted to grow a big onion.

If you can manage to get any onion plants of the variety "Kelsae" then I would encourage you to give it a go.

It's too late to sow a big one from seed now but plants or seedlings are OK.

Last Year I bought some plants "Kelsae" from Mr Fothergills,they were about £6 for 30 .

Although they weren't the biggest I've grown they were the best shape ever and averaged about 2.5 pounds,and last summer was rubbish weather.

Just give it a go,It's amazing.

You need patience though as they only start to grow the actual onion after June 21st the longest day.

So you'll just have this load of leaves 'till then and then wallop it starts to be an onion.

And then you can almost see it putting on weight.

All you can do is give it a bash !!!

The first time I grew one was about 8 years ago and I planted 6 plants in 10 litre pots of John Innes compost.

How easy is that ? and I managed about 2 pounds from my biggest.

Give it a go !!!

[char]

Thankyou so much for that! i will have a go and see how big i can get them, i love to see all you have grown , well done,

[Admin]

yes we want a giant onion to display on the site

[vegmandan]

Well following the debacle regarding my giant onion seedlings apparently being "lost in the post" my supplier assured me that he was going to send me some more today.

So i'm just going to have to wait a bit longer.

[Admin]

Hope it gets here this time you know you havnt got a greenhouse wouldnt it be cheaper to buy one of those heated propergators and raise your own seed..?? in the house ..i didnt used to have a heated propergator i used to use my window sills .. you couldnt see out the windows by the end of april..

[vegmandan]

Unfortunately not.

As they need to be grown in December to get a really big onion they are actually given artificial light to trick them into thinking its Spring when its still Winter as there just isn't enough daylight at that time of year.

I did do this once myself, I created a light chamber with 8 -4ft strip lights and kept them on for 16 hours a day.

I got fantastic results but an extra £300 'leccy bill

So I thought this year I'd let the supplier take the cost out of it for me.




And right on cue they have arrived today.

That's really made my day,as I didn't think that they would ever come.

I've just put the odd picture on my web site,It's nothing exciting but It might give you an idea as to how slowly they grow initially as the plants are now over 3 months old..

£30 for that little bunch of plants.....wow!!!

[char]

Fingers crossed it comes!!!

[Admin]

They are quite large Dan they look like our onions do in late june..I am pleased they have come as they certainly are not cheap and i hope you exceed your record with them..
Cheap they are not Still its your hobby and you get great pleasure from them so why not spoil yourself.
Do you just concentrate on giant onions and not other giant veg

[vegmandan]

I do really,because most other giant veg are pretty inedible,where as big onions are great to eat.

They might sound a bit dear but if they all average 5 lbs then thats 250 lbs of onions,about 12p a pound ?

As for the size of the plants I'm hoping that these will be 3 feet tall by June 21st with around 15-20+ leaves,as the more leaves the more onion rings and the bigger the onion.

I did grow a couple of pumpkins once 86 and 112 pounds but they just filled my tunnel up.

I did get a big ego trip out of it though when they put it in the local grocers window and did a guess the weight thing for charity.

A friend of mine won the hamper,by guessing the weight exactly.
I wonder how that happened.........hmmmm

[Admin]

Wow they are some pumpkin thats what i used to grow mostly but mine were never that large..Its a lovely hobby and very interesting hope you do well with the onion though i did google the largest onion and the man who grew it was on the big dig programme on uk tv gardens the other week..Well Dan hope you get the biggest onion..You can allways freeze surplus onions or even if you grew a pumpkin you could make pumpkin wine i made some once and its real nice..

[char]

Wow i am shocked at the Pumpkins, i grew some large ones a few years back but they stayed pure White, i know i may be asking a silly question but why was that? someone told me it was to do with the soil is that true?

[vegmandan]

As you can see one of mine was white.

I think it's because they just didn't get enough sunshine to ripen them off later in the year.

[Admin]

I used to cut the leaves away and let the sun get at them and also when i decided it was time i would finish them off inside on a windowledge..

[windy]

Wow Dan they're whoppers!!!!! Don't think mine will get that big somehow, but if I can get 3 for Halloween I'll be happy

[vegmandan]

Well I finally managed to get something planted today.

Even though it was chucking it down,I thought I'm going to have to get started sometime.

Nothing exciting,just a couple of rows of Shallots and Garlic but at least something's in now.


The best thing is that as these are all left over from last years crop then this years resulting crop will have cost me nothing !!! And as I'm a Yorkshireman thats the main thing.



See....I said it wasn't very exciting.