Bob Flowerdew: time to throw out

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with Bob Flowerdew, AG’s organic gardening expert

We’re told to plant only smaller onion sets, as larger sets are more likely to bolt

Bob’s top tips for the week

If you nip off the fl ower heads from bolters as soon as they are visible, plants switch their attention to swelling side-bulbs

You may have heard that it’s best to pull up any onions that bolt, but this isn’t always necessary with crops grown for home consumption

Know your onions

In our quest to grow a satisfying onion crop, we should treat received growing wisdom with caution, says Bob

ADVICE is always worth listening to –but it should also be questioned in case it’s in error or no longer applicable. We’re quite rightly told we should plant only smaller onion sets (the tiny onion bulbs we use in place of sowing seed) as larger se invariably bolt. We’re furth told to pull up any that do bolt “to stop them encouraging others” (but just how, nobody has ever explained). All well and good, if you want to grow perfect onions to sell or send up to the ‘Great House’, as bolters would flower, seed and wither, and not produce nice succulent bulbs. However, if you’re growing for home consumption, pulling bolters may waste a significant part of “Pulling bolters may waste a big part of your crop” your whole crop, and it could leave many empty gaps in your bed. I’ve experimented, and as long as you nip off the flower heads from these bolters as soon as they’re visible, the plants switch their attention to swelling side-bulbs instead. True, the resulting ren’t as big as they would om unbolted plants, they ke a bit longer to dry off hen harvested, and they are a tad more wasteful n the peeling. But you do get them for just de-heading the plants, ot pulling them. Now this is a good with sets, but it doesn’t well with sown plants, as these do not have the same reserves. However, I wondered whether it could work with last year’s homegrown onions that had started to sprout, as these usually just go to waste. Planting sprouted onions, these rush to bolt; however, if these are promptly deheaded, then they behave more like shallots and swell a couple or more quite usable (if misshaped) bulbs. Again, these take a little longer to dry off and to prepare, but are a great bonus crop for free. Drying the side bulbs of bolted onions

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Dig or cover green manures now, so that they are really well

rotted down by the time you want to sow and plant.

2Inspect chitting potatoes; look carefully at their shoots for aphids as these often appear, and kill them with a soft soap spray.

3Sow onion and leek seed in trays under cover and, likewise, start off your onion sets in wee pots or cells.

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