Mine only had a very few "grocery store sized" onions with a lot of small golf ball sized but I love them all the same. Last weekend I used kitchen shears to cut tops and long roots before moving my onions to the indoor pantry. A few seemed a little moist when I cut the tops so I put them on top to use first for fear they wouldn't keep.

ok thanks Mia I appreciate the response. My first onions also and isn't it fun to grow your own?

Jill,

I'm going to link a newsletter from Dixondale Farms that discusses the drying, curing and storage of onions. Dixondale Farms, based in Carizo Springs, Texas, is a major supplier of onion plants and their website has very helpful information on it, including growing guides, and all their monthly newsletters from the last few years.

Drying the onions involves letting the formerly green tops dry down. This most often occurs while the onions are still in the ground.Next year, watch and you'll see that first the neck of the onion, where the stalk comes out of the bulb, weakens and falls over, but the top is still green. Drying the onions means waiting for the green tops to turn yellow and tan and shrink down. You can let this step occur while the onions still are in the ground, or pulled out of the ground and laid right on top of the soil. This also lets the roots dry out. Obviously, once the necks are falling over you don't want to irrigate the onions any more because watering them doesn't do them any good at that point and can interfere in both the drying and curing process.

This year, many of us had torrential rainfall for several weeks immediately before or during the time the onion necks were falling over and the onions should have been drying out. Because it was both hot and very wet, some of us went ahead and pulled our onions as soon as the necks were falling over and then let them dry out on tables, screens, etc. in a shady spot. The reason a gardener would do this is because hot, wet weather at the time the onions are falling over can lead to fungal diseases, rot, and problems with getting the onions to dry and cure properly.

As the onions dry down, the moisture and energy flows into the bulbs, which is part of the natural process. You can use onions any time you choose, including pulling them occasionally and using them before the necks even start falling over, but in order to ensure your crop maintains its quality for months, you want the onions to dry and cure well before you put them into storage.

Once they have dried down, you cure them. Curing them allows the moisture in the onions to dry down to some extent and as it does that, the scales (layers) of the onions draw together. Near the top of the onion this is especially noticeable as the scales basically pull themselves together to sort of close up the spot where the leaves had emerged from the bulb. This is the most important part of the curing process as it contributes to the longevity of the onion in storage.

Once the scales of the onions have shrunk down (the onions are merely drier than they were to begin with, they still have adequate moisture within), you can clip off the tops of the onions where the leaves had emerged from the bulb, and you also can clip off the roots as close as possible to the bulb itself.

Then, store them in a cool, dry, dark place, but check them periodically and remove any onions that are starting to sprout or rot. I store mine in Dixondale's mesh nets that are in a tubular shape, hanging them in my walk-in pantry. When I have more onions than mesh netting, I store them in plastic storage crates that have plastic mesh sides to allow for good air flow.

While most of the onion varieties we can grow here in Oklahoma will only last 2-4 months in storage (more about that in a second), with very good drying and curing, and in a great storage location, you sometimes can get your onions to last 6 to 8 months, which is really outstanding in our climate.

The reason our onions do not store as well here as onions grown in more northern climates is because the short-day and intermediate-day type onions we grow here are mostly sweet onions, and they do not store as well or for as long as the more pungent long-day onion types.There are a few of the more pungent types that grow well in southern climates, and those easily store for 6 to 8 months or even longer.

If you grow a lot of onions and have more than you can eat fresh, you can chop or slice them and freeze the excess amount that is above and beyond what you think y'all can eat before they go bad. I freeze mine in different quantities, usually in 1/4 and 1/2 portions that I can mix-and-match to equal the amount of onions that a recipe calls for. Because I make a lot of salsa every year, I also chop and freeze onions in the quantity needed for a batch of salsa. I also slice some onions along with sweet peppers and freeze them to use when making fajitas in the winter months.

Finally, when I find an onion sprouting in the pantry, instead of just tossing it on the compost pile, I take it out to the garden and plant it in a perennial border that is on the south and west sides of the garden. Next spring, that sprouting onion will flower. The flowers are pretty globes made up of tiny flowers, and the flowers attract many beneficial and pollinator insects to the garden.

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: Onion Storage Tips from Dixondale Farms