Bolting Onions

[Valleyman]

I can't believe it. I just wandered down to the veg patch a noticed several of my onions have bolted. Arg.

I knew the late cold spells were bad news!

[KevinM67]

Have you been growing them from seed ?

[Jay-ell]

Are these overwintered onions or from sets planted this year?

I have some overwintering onions popping up flowers - I just snap off the scrapes, take them home and fry them. Im just hoping that with the flowers snapped off they get back to building up the bulbs (a couple of them seem to be starting to swell)

[Lumpy]

The only thing is that when onions start to produce dlowers the bulbs won't fatten up too well even if you have removd the flower spike. They tend not to store as good either.
I always leave a few to flower as they attract the bugs and will produce the seeds from which I can grow tiddley little onions for salads.

[Snow]

Mine too, about half of them, overwinter ones. Annoying.

[Valleyman]

Are these overwintered onions or from sets planted this year?

I have some overwintering onions popping up flowers - I just snap off the scrapes, take them home and fry them. Im just hoping that with the flowers snapped off they get back to building up the bulbs (a couple of them seem to be starting to swell)

It's the overwintered sets that are bolting. The sets i put in this spring haven't bolted yet. Fingers crossed. I'm removing the flowers and marking the ones that have bolted with little sticks, as I'll eat these first.

[Jay-ell]

I haven't marked those that have bolted as id just end up with a forest of sticks next to each and every onion. The only ones which haven't bolted yet are so small that they can pass as scallions if they can grow a bit more.

But they were in the ground when I took the plot so are a bonus any way.

The Japanese onions on my other plot haven't started bolting yet (knocking crossed fingers on a wooden rabbits fpot) but aren't as well developed as those on the new plot..

[Jonnyt]

Nearly all my over wintered ones have bolted. It's the first time I've bothered with them and this is really annoying!

[Noosner]

Sympathies to all, that must be annoying. My overwintered ones are ok so far... it's the first year I've tried them. And I'm hoping it will be my first successful year of onions as normally I can't grow them to any size at all.

[veggiechicken]

My overwintering ones have bolted too I'm snapping off the scapes and hoping for the best!

[VolesAteMyPeas]

All my over wintered ones bolted. Only white ones though. The red ones are fine so far. Bad year for it it seems!

[ancee]

I was just coming on here to put the same thing! My husband dug all,of our over wintered ones out this morning. I've tied them up and hung them in the shed. They'll get eaten, but I wish I hadn't bought a bag of onions yesterday. Wonder what had caused it? I'm wondering whether to bother with them this year, as for the last three years any leek, onion, garlic or shallot in this garden has suffered from rust. Which is what I was moaning about when I noticed the red, white and brown onions and the shallots had bolted! The garlic hasn't yet, but it has rust any tips anyone!? Or shall I just give up on alliums and grow something else! Interestingly I have ornamental alliums in the flower borders and they aren't rusty at all!

[Valleyman]

Looks to be a running trend.

I am putting it down to the cold snap we had about two weeks ago where the night time temps dropped to almost freezing after a strangely warm april. At the time I was panicking about the greenhouse with the sensitive toms.

Turns out I should have been worried about the onions that thought autumn was arriving.

[veggiechicken]

Mine have been bolting for longer than 2 weeks

[Valleyman]

Mine have been bolting for longer than 2 weeks

Onion tarts for tea every night for you veggiechicken