The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1891-05-04
Onion Culture.

! l-A-@~--'
Onion Culture.
ruring the past twelve or eighteen months
-sadsrs Of the horticultural papers may
Il 20 observed various articles on tue SUD.
+ s,- II onion culture, with the appended
,brs.e new method Of cultivation" 'two
4 b,us.nd bushels a possible yield under the
+, ,sw plan" and so on.
The Ohio Experiment Station was-led to
make list Of the so-called new methods the
mast year, and bulletin No. 9 is partly de-
Voted to the exposition of its advantages.
The new method in growing onions consists
in sowing the seed in cold frames, or such
/ saad beds as will answer the purpose, and
i rhsn setting out the plants when proper
season arrived. Very extensive trials will
4 d,ubtless be made of the method this year.
4 and we have no doubt it Will become a
4 very popular practice, especially among
home gardeners, when its advantages be-
o9me more generally known. So far as he
Knows. the writer of these lines observed
The practice some years before the present
+ hand of enthusiasts came upon the field as
exponents of new methods in onion culture.
some sixteen or eighteen years ago the
/ writer adopted the plan as an original idea
10 him. and in the following years wherever
the culture of onion was included in his
garden operations invariably observed the
plan with a considerably position of the
crop. In the Southern Cttytiuator for 1877,
September number, page $50, the writer
described the method and commended it to
the consideration Of southern gardeners and
truckers. Since that time We have had &C.
casion to describe the method in several
other journals, for it is one that, when once
adopted. is not likely to be given up A
recent writer in Popular Gardening, and
a practical gardener, presumably, gives his
experience with transplanted onions as fol-
lows
Five years ago bought one pound of
Extra Early Pearl onion seed By Sept
Is TIE seed was sown pretty thick in rows
nine inches apart. The plants soon showed
up, and the bright little green seedlings
grew about three inches high, and so re-
NAMED all winter IN the open ground, with~
out the least covering or protection of any
kind. As soon as the weather permitted in
early spring, L began to transplant to a
piece of ground prepared and manured the
autumn before. transplanted about four
inches apart, the rows one foot apart, and
the only manure used during the spring
months was wood ashes Sown broadcast
over the rows; the onions ripened finely,
and when they were pulled, were sight to
behold. They were bushels of them-large,
waxy, white onions-five and six inches
across. But that was not all, for had
second crop that same year. That same
spring, when l was through transplanting
t,He I =
OF extra early pearl onion seed, and drilled
in thick to raise sets. In due time they
ripened and were harvested, and by Oct. l
were set out, three inches apart, in rows one
foot apart, and March began to pull the
cropfor early market.
Two such wonderful crops, one in early
spring, the other in autumn have been I'M
falling with me each year during the last
five years, this being the sixth. From where
sit as 1 write. this tenth day of February,
| can see the rows of little Seeding onions
standing, thousands strong, like 50 many
sentinels pointing the way TO this, another
new onion culture Tor my experiments are
experiments no longer"
In the bulletin above alluded to the horti-
culturlst of the station, W. J. Green, in a
very interesting illustrated article on the
cluSion:
/. Transplanting onions increased the
yield 100 per cent. in some cases, and gave
q decided gain with all varieties. The varie-
ties that gave the best results were: Pom
pen, Prizetaker aud White Victoria italian
sorts. Those showing the smalled gain
were: DAnvers, Weathersfield and Michi-
gan.
q The transplanted onions were larger
and more uniform in size than those grown
from seed in the ordinary manner.
g. The transplanted onions ripened from
three to four weeks earlier than those grown
from seed not trensplanted.
A. The extra labor involved in transplant
ing was Offset by the saving of labor in
wedding. The increase in crop without a
corresponding increase in labor lessened the
cost per bushel in production.
Estimating the yield per acre from the
small plats used in making the tests, to w.t.:
sixteen square feet, the product Of each of
the three varieties above named was up
ward of 1 200 bushels. The rows were one
foot apart, and the plants set out three
inches apart in the rows. This distance OBJ
served on an acre would give ia 240 plants
or onions. To produce a crop of 900
bushels it is only necessary to make the
onions attain an average weight of about
five ounces, thing certainly not very diff
fcult to secure on rich soil with the giant
Italian varieties.
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