This year I am attempting to beat my personal record weight of 6lb 10oz.
   achieved in 2003.I'll be growing the World Record Holding variety - Ailsae

  Here are a couple of pics - my best onion last year on the left - about 3.5 lbs but a fantastic shape and my biggest ever of 6lb 10oz on the right.

 March 26th  Well I decided to replant my seedlings as they were getting a bit cramped

I know they don't look like much now but come September I hope they will be 5lb+.

   I know they look a bit limp at the moment,but they will pick up once they start to grow.

 April 1st  Well what a difference a week makes.They are now all upright and growing well.

  April 12th Just a quick update,as you can see they have grown quite a bit in the last 10 days or so and have also grown some more leaves.They're about 9 inches tall now and I'll be hopefully planting them out in the bed in around a week to 10 days.

 April 22nd.   Decided to plant my onion plants in the polytunnel this evening.

 As you can see they now have a cracking set of roots and should take well in the new bed.

 I've planted them 15 inches apart and 18 inches between the rows

 Now its just a matter of giving them a good soak with seaweed liquor to help with the rooting and then put the metal rings over them to give them support.

 The plants are about 15 inches tall and have about 3-4 leaves,I'm hoping for 20 by July.

 May 6th  Just a quick update.The onions seem to have transplanted well and are now growing on nicely.Have put the final leaf support rings over the plants at about 18" as the leaves are almost 2ft long now.

 May 18th      Just a quick update,everythings still growing well.

 May 29th

  Well 11 days after the last update and things are really moving fast.

 Up to about 8 leaves now and they are still growing well,leaves about 30 inches tall.

 June 7th.

 Just a quick update.Still growing well,about 10-11 leaves on now.

 June 16th

 Well now that the longest day is fast approaching the onions are just starting to bulb up.

So in the next 8 weeks they will put all their weight on and hopefully be a bit more interesting to look at.

 I've found one growing which could be the record breaker,It's growing stronger and bigger than the rest and has about 14 leaves already so I'm pinning my hopes on this one.

                                                      this is the one !!!

  June 24th

Oh no...possible disaster !!

Some of the onions after growing so well so far have now decided to send out a secondary set of leaves from the neck of the onion which can result in a mis-shapen bulb or even cause the bulb to split into two.

I may be being a bit paranoid and I may be lucky and get away with just mis-shapen ones,and the rest growing normally, but it is a bit annoying.

As you can see in the 2 pics the second set of leaves now growing.

But hopefully nothing serious will come of it and I don't get a load of them dividing into 2,and the ones that are misbehaving just become a bit oddly shaped.Maybe the extra leaves might even help to make the odd onion even bigger,if a bit on the ugly side .

June 29th

 Well a week on and no more of the onions seem to have misbehaved by growing double necks.

I still have about 16 in the main bed which are growing correctly.

                        What an onion neck should look like                                                       What an onion neck should not look like

 So I now have a new possible record breaker,fingers crossed ,it is growing perfectly and vigourously.

HOME