If your onion stalks are starting to look a little yelllow and are begining to fall over, it means they are just about ready to harvest. Once they get to that stage, they’re done growing.
Our white slicing onions are doing just that:
To prepare our onions for harvest, we will knock over any stalks that haven’t fallen over yet on their own and let them dry a bit in the garden.
After lifting them from the garden, we partially dry them in an airy place out of the sun for a couple of weeks. This drying process is called “curing”. It helps the onion form that familiar onion skin which seals the inner part of the bulb and keeps it from damage.
After curing, we cut off the dried stalk (leaving a couple of inches) and store them in a cool, dark place until we are ready to use them.
Not all onion varieties will be ready to harvest at the same time. Take for example our red onions, which are still green and standing up tall. They are a couple of weeks or more away from harvest:
If you store your onions, plan on using the ones with the thickest stalk first as they don’t keep as well as the thinner stalked bulbs.
Also remember that some varieties will keep in storage longer than others. We always plant the “Copra” variety of onion for long term storage. It is a yellow cooking onion which is very pungent when eaten raw. When cooked, the Copra takes on a wonderful sweet flavor.
The rest of our onions were selected for their taste, color or shape.
Bob