Onion Growing Simplified—avorrs xruxm, 3s, 
New 
HOW TO HAVE ONIONS THAT ARE REALLY ONIONS IN FLAVOR AND SIZE—A CONCISE REPLY TO THE 
PERENNIAL QUESTION, 
EW classes of vegetables are as 
willing to accommodate the planter 
as the onions. He may have them 
in quite a variety of colors, from 
early in August until the crop of the 
next year is ready to harvest. If he is 
eareful in his selection, he may even 
choose the quality of the flesh to suit 
his own particular taste. And yet, easy 
as it is to grow onions such as are de- 
scribed and illustrated here, more peo- 
ple fail, perhaps, with them, than with 
any other crop (excepting, of course, 
cauliflower and mushrooms!!). 
The principal reasons for this are 
found, perhaps, in the fact that ama- 
teurs will attempt to grow them in 
soil that is utterly unfit (hard, stony 
soil) and that the seedlings do not 
get the proper attention at a time 
when they need it most. No other 
crop is as delicate in the “baby” 
stage as onions; but after they once 
pass that crucial period in their devel- 
opment, no trouble will be experienced 
to secure a crop, if the soil is free of 
maggots. 
Onions may be divided, according to 
their usefulness to the planter, into two 
broad classes: (1) the extra early for- 
eign sorts; and (2) the later, but better 
keeping American onions. While the 
assortment of foreign sorts is quite as 
large as that of our native sorts, yet, in 
our choice of foreign sorts for the aver- 
age home garden we need consider only 
three of them. The balance of foreign 
sorts are, as a rule, grown only for 
special purposes and therefore do not 
deserve consideration here. The rea- 
son why three foreign sorts are in- 
cluded is because one—the Queen or 
Barletta—is without question the earl- 
iest of all onions, while the other two, 
under special cultiva- 
tion, will prove the 
largest of all. 
Southport Red Globe, the heaviest yielder and the best 
keeper 
Judging the three classes of 
American onions as three units, 
it is safe to call the white sorts 
the mildest; the yellow sorts the 
most dependable; and the red 
sorts the strongest and latest, but 
the best keepers. Classifying 
them according to their 
shape, we find the flat sorts 
to be generally earlier than 
the globe and semi-globe 
shaped sorts. Taken as a 
whole, all American onions 
keep well except American 
Red WOH GUSH three quarters its natural size. 
AN 
a. 
Grown Prizetakers and it seems that 
twenty-five years of acclimatization 
has not been able to put a greater 
solidity and hence better keeping quali- 
ties in this originally Spanish variety. 
White Queen, the earliest of all 
onions. It is an imported variety 
es 
. 
2 PSs 
nee 
variety 
239 
Wy 
NN 
a 
A meritorious red 
“port Yellow Globe. 
“WHICH VARIETIES, AND WHY?” 
Poor strains of seed are found among 
onions perhaps with more frequency 
than in anything else, and the question 
of price of seed should not enter the 
mind of the planter who wants true-to- 
type onions of proper qualities. Cheap 
onion seed is cheap either because the 
strain is full of “rogues”—off-colored 
bulbs, or flat bulbs in the globe type, or 
vice versa—or the seed is old, in which 
case you may look for an unusually high 
percentage of “thicknecks’—i. e., onion 
plants with a very thick stalk refusing 
to “bottom” or make a bulb. Again, 
onions adapt themselves quickly to dif- 
ferent climatic and soil conditions. In. 
doing so, minor characteristics of the 
strain such as color of skin, quality of 
flesh and firmness are often changed. 
Asa rule, these changes are for the bet- 
| ter since the variety is simply trying to 
' do its best under new conditions. 
In referring to the table of standard 
varieties, please note that I have marked 
both Ohio Yellow Globe and Michigan 
Yellow Globe as being superfluous, be- 
cause generally they are too much like 
either Yellow Globe Danvers or South- 
But that does not 
mean that Ohio Yellow Globe wouldn’t 
be preferable for Ohio growers 
, and Michigan Yellow Globe for 
. the growers of that state. 
With onions as well as with 
every other vegetable, it will pay 
the planter to do four things: 
First, ‘take stock” of varieties and 
strains available; second, to clearly 
Weta his wants; third, to see that 
climatic and soil conditions are favor- 
able toward making an attempt worth 
while; and finally, to decide to weed, in 
order to give the cultivated crop a 
chance to survive. 
To grow onions suc- 
cessfully from seed ing 
Southport White Globe, the handsomest of all 
American onions 
one season you must be willing 
to do a great deal of hand weed- 
ing and to cultivate freely with 
both hand hoe and wheel hoe. 
The development of the seedlings 
should not be retarded by weeds 
and since rich soil grows plenty 
of weeds equally with good 
onions, onion growing during the 
first few months develops largely 
into a battle between the man 
and the weeds. 
Here is the programme that was 
pursued in connection with the 
