Onions, is it the time to grow them?

[Scrappy Coco]

The climate is pretty warm where I live, is it the right time to germinate onion seeds?

[tomc]

I would talk to local gardeners, but I expect onion is a winter crop for you. Look at short-day onions.

[rainbowgardener]

I responded to your question about garlic here: viewtopic.php?f=48&t=57399&p=327979#p327979

Garlic and onions are all alliums with basically the same growth habits. They are cool weather crops that are planted in fall.

I'm sure it is warming up for you already and you need to be thinking about warm weather crops - tomatoes, basil, peppers, squash, corn, beans, etc.

[Scrappy Coco]

This may seem like a newbie question, and I guess I know the answer to it. But how come we get onions in the summer, is it like some sort of greenhouses that keep cold in, or?

[rainbowgardener]

No, onions are very slow, especially from seed. Plant onion seed in the fall, it grows through the winter, going dormant some of the time if your winters are cold enough and starts up again in the spring. Sometime around June or July it gets harvested.

[imafan26]

Yes, that is true. If your longest days are only 10-14 hours long, you need to grow short day onions. They are the only kind that can get their bulbs to mature with less daylight. Downside, they tend not to be great keepers.

People who have 16 hours or more of daylight can grow the long day onions.

In mild climates onions are planted usually from seeds not sets in the fall. The tops grow through the cool months and the bulbs will begin to mature as the weather warms and the days get longer. It takes about 5 months from seed to harvest.

I planted my awahia and Texas granex in October last year and they started bulbing up in March and they are ready now. I can usually plant seeds between October and November.

I can't start from sets in the spring since they won't have enough time to mature and the sets that are sent here usually are not the right kind.

[tomc]

Onion is stored after going dormant in cool-cold rooms. Not grown in one, Or at least I've never heard of it.

[imafan26]

No such thing in hawaii. No root cellars, I would have to keep them in the fridge and they would in turn rot my potatoes. In summer our day temps are usually in the 80's and nights maybe in the low 70's. Although this year it has been in the 60's.

My Texas granex onions are dried on my lanai after harvest since it always seems to rain when I need to dry them in the field. They are very sweet and like eating an apple for the first couple of weeks then they turn hot and eye-burning. If I don't use them soon enough they will start rotting from the necks.

Onions grow very well here. They are slow to start but they make nice big tops though the wet season since there is no snow to make them go dormant.

Post harvesting is the time when it is hard for me to keep them cool enough to keep them from turning hot.