Vanisle_BC
Greener Thumb
Posts: 1354
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2015 9:02 pm
Location: Port Alberni, B.C. Canada, Zone 7 (+?)

Can onion sets be stored?

I've bought 2 bags of onion sets, red & yellow - varieties unnamed. There's more than I want to plant. Does anyone know whether there's a way to store the surplus till next spring? Or some other use for them? I suppose they're edible but .... ?

User avatar
applestar
Mod
Posts: 30514
Joined: Thu May 01, 2008 7:21 pm
Location: Zone 6, NJ (3/M)4/E ~ 10/M(11/B)

I think onion sets are too tiny to save until next spring. They would dry out. They would grow scallions and green onions even if they won’t bulb up properly — it should be possible to pop them in wherever you have room throughout the season?

Unless organic and from source you can verify with, I wouldn’t trust casually conventional onion sets to eat. They might be grown or treated with class of fungicides or pesticides without expectation of them being eaten at this stage, or anything else you can think of. They might have been exposed to things that would be prohibited in a grocery food shipping/storage process.

pepperhead212
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 2851
Joined: Wed Oct 15, 2014 1:52 pm
Location: Woodbury NJ Zone 7a/7b

I always buy a bunch of tiny onions at this time of year, at the Asian market, to grow scallions. They store only 'til mid summer, and the smaller ones dry up, if I haven't used them all. I always use the smallest first, for this reason, planting a dozen or so a week.

User avatar
TomatoNut95
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 2069
Joined: Sun May 26, 2019 11:11 am
Location: Texas Zone 8

Nope, onion sets don't keep long. Trust me. Been there, smelled that. 😳



Return to “Onion Gardening Forum”