ONIONS 179 



of the bulb should be about an inch deep in the ground. 

 The plants are easily moved, and if the soil is well firmed 

 they are very sure to live. About 150,000 plants are 

 required for an acre, and it is a big job to transplant them. 

 For this purpose children can generally be employed at 

 low wages and they will do the work very well if carefully 

 looked after. The expense of transplanting is variously esti- 

 mated at from $25 to $50 per acre. Subsequent culti- 

 vation is the same as for a field crop of onions. 



Marketing. In a general way the directions for market- 

 ing onions apply to any other crop. They should be 

 sold as soon as a fair price can be obtained for them, and 

 not stored unless there is a good chance of a rise. In 

 some localities there is a large demand for onions for 

 bunching purposes before the bulbs are formed. In these 

 places it will sometimes pay to pull and sell the crop before 

 the tops have died down, but generally it should be allowed 

 to ripen. The foreign kinds such as can only be raised 

 here by transplanting method, are generally highest in 

 price in early autumn and should then be sold. The tops 

 should always be removed before the bulbs are marketed, 

 and all small bulbs should be picked out and sold sepa- 

 rately for pickling purposes. 



Most markets prefer onions of medium size, globular 

 rather than flat in shape, and yellow or white in color rather 

 than red. Very large onions of the common type are not 

 so salable as those of medium size; but of the foreign kinds 

 the larger the better, and good specimens sometimes weigh 

 as much as two pounds. When marketed in quantities 

 they are often sold by the hundred-pound sack. 



Yields. The United States produced about $10,000,000 

 worth of onions in 1908 and imported about 1,400,000 

 bushels from Spain, Bermuda, and other countries. Grow- 



