Just about all the nice veggies are gone from the garden, eaten by one mule deer who will not stop. But my onions are large and ready to harvest. How should I dry and store them?

Thanks,

Maggie

Pull them up, tie them in bundles of about 5 or 6 to the bunch. Hang them in the garage/carport, laundry room, barn, front porch, under the back deck cover etc. Keep them dry and out of sunlight till the tops are completely dry and crumbly. Snip the tops off about 1/2 inch above the onions and box them up, or leave them hanging till you use them.
Some people skip the bunch and dry part, snip the tops off and box them, but they will keep longer if you air dry them for a few weeks.

I took mine out and laid them on the ground for 24 hours. Did I ruin them, or do I just go ahead and bunch them now and let them dry? Thanks!

Eden, your fine...just put them somewhere inside like a garage, and spread them out or hang them to dry for a couple of weeks.

I have mine in a wheelbarrow right now...I need to spread them out myself...Farmhound is true...they should keep longer that way.

After they are dry, using pantyhose to keep the onions from touching, for best keeping is an option.

Drop one in the leg of old pantyhose then tie a knot, and drop another....when its full hang it somewhere dry and cool, snip one off at a time.

Wow, what a great idea. Thanks so much!

I actually did use a couple pairs of panty hose today for them, hangin in my garage....here they are before cutting the tops and hanging...ill have to take an after pic later,lol.

Once they're dry, can they be stored were it freezes?

My basement is very damp.

My garage is detached from the house, so it sees -10ºF on cold winter days.

The house is heated, although I'm considering a small closet by the bathroom may be relatively temperature stable and away from baseboards / wood stove / windows / etc.

Not that it's important this year...first time I've tried onions, I have ONE big beauty Plus a handful of small ones whose tops flopped so I harvested them and will use them up this week.

Matt...my garage is cold too in the winter, and if I still have good onions left when the weather gets too cold, ill just bring them in like I would from the supermarket.

Same with garlic...by that time, neither will stink up the house..actually neither will by now.

Happy to say I got over a dozen good sized onions and all still had great paper on them, though they had been down for a few days when I dug them. A couple were cut, so I cooked with one and put the other in the frig. I wrapped the stalks with pony tail holders and then trimmed them. I then put them on a CD shelf with the bulbs over the edge, hope that works like hanging. My basement is dry and cool, so I hope they will dry well.

Those walla walla's are the best I've ever grown.

Maggie

Another new onion grower here. Mine went in late and most are still standing tall. (Except one I snitched to eat tonight. ).

So asking around at the farmer's market on Saturday, one lady told me to stamp the greens down. Upon questioning, she said to do that after the seed head forms. Another said forget it, just let them fall over when they're ready. Haven't seen any seed heads yet. Should I? Should I snip them off (like garlic scapes)? I'm not too keen on the stamping thing. Anybody here do that?

BTW -- farmhound, thanks for the drying info!

Liz, my seed heads formed weeks to months before the onions fell over, but these were Walla Walla's, which are known for forming early seed heads. Per the advice of others on the forum, I clipped the seed heads back and let the onions keep growing.

I have grown another type of onion which didn't set seed heads until year two (a deer ate the seed head for the one that I left in the ground over winter.)

They do fall over by themselves pretty reliably when they are ready. But you can pull them before they reach their final size if you like. My primary determiner for early pulling is just feeling around the bulb to see how large and round they are. Seems like they almost double in size right before they fall over. Only my third time growing, so I am not the expert.

Maggie

If they are putting up a seed head, they arent gonna be much good. That seed head makes a big hollow stem through the onion. You dont want them to seed. When mine put up a seed head, I pull them right then and eat them. Cause they wont keep. Stress and odd weather conditions make them bolt and seed. Like heavy frost after a warm spell, or excessive heat then a cool spell, then hot again. They think they have lived through 2 seasons and bolt to make babies.
Onions should not seed the first year.
Let them fall over on their own. Pull and bunch them as they fall over.
Also, one more tip. Along about the middle of September, Take some of your big dry onions, put them on some loose soil and cover them with leaves. Not too deep, just dump a few on them to bury them. Then check back about Thanksgiving. You can have fresh green onions with your thanksgiving day dinner. The onions will divide and put up green shoots or sprouts. Mighty tasty and fresh in the early stages of winter.

Farm - when my walla walla's threw up seed heads early, other growers told me that was typical. I clipped them all down and have beautiful onions which have dried up just fine. But one did something strange, the seed head bulged in the middle late in the season, along the stalk. That one was split and obviously trying to reproduce. I grew from starts.

The other variety of onion I grew did not seed until year two, which was actually year three (as it was grown from a start). As the deer ate the seed head, I am wondering if the onion itself might be pulled up and divided like a garlic.

I used to grow onions, and if I missed one or two at harvest time they would put up a seed head the following season. At that point they were no longer good to eat, but the flowers were nice, though, and bees loved them.
You can get a seed head if you bury a sprouting onion (even a store bought one) somewhere in the garden, I get many from my compost as well.
I have one "wild" onion growing in a corner, and instead of a seed head it shoots up a full head of bulbils every year. It's some kind of walking onion, but looks more like chives (and it's not chives).

The seed stalks are bad! I have noticed much more problem with seeding on onions grown from sets. They are really last year's baby onions and the red onion sets I have bought always throw up seed heads and don't get big. So I buy seedlings in spring and have had really excellent results with those. This year I did grow both sets and seedlings and the seedlings did way better! and absolutely no seed stalks from them, even the walla walla.