The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-10-31
Onion Growing In the south.

A correspondent of the Farmer and Fruit
Grower makes some correct observations
about the popular and profitable vegetable
He says: I'm the lower Gulf states where
winter gardens are practicable the onion
is often grown with great success and pro-
fit. Indeed, the Southern grower has sew
eral decided advantages over his North
ern brother. The crop is almost entirely
free from insect enemies and from dis
eases. II comes into market at a time
when the old crop is nearly used up and
therefore prices are pretty sure to be good
Among northern growers there is quite
range Of varieties to select from. This
Is not true at the South. The Bermuda
onion, so far as the writer's experience
goes, is the only one that is at all worth
while to attempt to cultivate. Eighteen
years ago. when the writer first begin
experimenting in the matter in South
Florida, he took the advice of Northern
seedsmen and tried some half dozen highly
recommended Spanish and Italian Vari-
ties. 1t was simply money and time
thrown away. 1t was not until he learned
of dealer from whom he could obtain
with certainty the seed of the genuine
Bermuda variety that he was ever able
to do anything in onion growing. There
are now seedsmen through the South who
handle the genuine seed, which does not
reach here until about the first of Octo-
ber In South Florida onion seed will sell
dom terminate well if sown before the first
of November. II should be planted by a
good drill. Fifteen inches apart is about
the proper space to leave between the
rows. If. however, quite a crop is to be
grown it is best to make arrangements for
cultivation with horse hoe. In this case
every third row should have a space of
twenty inches. This will give room for
the horse to travel and, by removing two
teeth, the rows on either side can be
straddled by the cultivator and nearly all
the heavy work can be done in this way
The onion needs frequent and light hoe
ing, and If worked by horse hoe is much
more likely to get needed culture than
when IL all has to be done with the old
fashioned hand hoe. OF course, the weed
ing and thinning has TO be done in the
old back-aching way and there is no ma
chine invented or likely to be that can
here take the place of human fingers and
a narrow, light hoe.
The onion prefers a rich, moist loam It
can be grown, however, on the high pine
lands of the South with fair success, and
better still on the richer "hammocks and
sometimes on the muck lands" The So
called fiat woods also gives fair crops
after the land is properly drained. No
man, however, should undertake onion
culture in the South or anywhere else I'M
less he is prepared to invest literally in
fertilizers. If he will not do this he had
better by all means stop before he begins
Barnyard manure, unless 1t has been so
thoroughly comDosted as to kill the seeds
of grasses and weeds, is not advisable in
onion culture. The manure is all right,
but the weeds are MOI, and any man who
tries 1t once and has to do his own hoeing
will he a convert to commercial fertilizers
for the rest of his natural life.
A fertilizer giving the following analy-
sis will be about right for most of the
sandy soils of the South: Four per cent,