Giant Onions 2014

Turned the heat down to 13 degrees,need to slow them down abit

 

Pricked out my Kelsaes....they're a bit spindly but not bad roots on them

 

Mine go out into Cold Greenhouse once germinated - don't want them stressing as that can lead to bolting. Mine you, I have zero idea if that is relevant to growing a Whopper!

 

@Kristen ...i'm just going by what i did last year,it's only the second year i've tried to grow an onion let alone a giant and i didn't do too badly so i daren't change a thing....but now you've got me thinking i might try what you do with a couple and stop fretting over them.....

 

I bought some seeds yesterday and was ready to sow but have no cell trays. Will buy those tomorrow and sow them.

My question is ... I assume I need heat to get the seeds to germinate, but is it OK to turn the heat off, once they are up. My propagator isn't too accurate, so I don't really want to be paying for electricity for the next 10 weeks, just for the onions.

I'm not interested in 'showing' but this will be my first year on my allotment, so I don't want to look like a fool with wee small onions, with my neighbour having big 'uns

 

you need to keep them growing slowly and steadily and not "checking the growth" if sowing now. People who show or want very big onions need the xtra time so they can bulk up so a little heat to keep them ticking over would be the ideal plus we dont have the daylight hours some of the GC members have grow lights set up at the ready.
Plenty of time for snow and freezing temperatures so even in the greenhouse would need protection at this time of year .

Spruce

 

Everything germinating in my propagator comes out of it once germinated (I maybe give them a week after they germinate, opening their individual lids a bit during that time).

Thereafter they get what they need (i.e. "By The Book), but there is no point giving heat without light, as plants need both to grow. Germination is a separate issue, and many pants won't germinate until "Spring" and thus need a heat boost to trigger germination. Also, providing heat means that more seed germinate, and over a tighter interval, which is convenient for Growers to have them all at the same stage ... although I grow some tricky blighters that have their germination spread over a year - some fast, some slow - which is another trick of survival: germinate at random times and hope that you get Water and Light when you do!

My book says 10-16C for germination and NO MORE than 13C thereafter until they are planted out.

 

I grew-on some onion seedlings under lights on year and then panicked as I read that bulb formation is triggered by day length, and I thought I might be giving them enough hours to induce that! Augmenting the amount of light would be fine of course, but I wonder if there might be such as a thing as too many hours, of artificial light, for Onions?

 

The mind boggles

Sorry Kristen

 

Your mind boggles? You should see my pants!

One day I'll tell you how I do it

 

I read something similar once, it said roughly up to the longest day they grow leaves, the more leaves you get up until then, the bigger the bulb will be.
After the longest day, bulb formation takes place, so in short you need to grow as many leaves as possible up till the end of June.

 

FWIW, I found leaf production still takes place after this time, but not with the same vigour.

 

Kelsaes so far

 

As far as I'm concerned, it's slow but sure growth you're after. If I remember right, once mine had germinated I turned the heat setting down, but also uncovered during the day. I did pretty much the same when they were potted up. As for lighting, I think I had it switched on for maybe 10 or 11 hours?