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NEW ONION CULTURE
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Presented to the
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO
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1980
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THE STORY of
The
New Onion
Culture
Che
Net Onion Culture
A Complete Guide
In Growing Onions for Profit
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By T. GREINER
Rewritten and Greatly Enlarged
Illustrated
New York
ORANGE JUDD COMPANY
19il
CONTENTS
PREFACE
THe WHY AND WHEREFORES, a sort of introduction.
A fable—The cat’s trick—History of the new
onion culture—Blessings of an own home—
Large scale operations—Horticultural training
for your boy.
CHAPTER I
Wett Becun, Hatr Done. How the plants are grown
Procuring seed—Growing seed—Plants in
boxes—Hotbeds—Sowing the seed—Fire hot-
beds—Hotbeds heated. by waste steam—Cheap
greenhouses—Plants for sale—Damping off—
Soils for flats, frames and benches—Trimming
the plants while growing.
CHAPTER II
As You Make Your BED, so you will lie Fe "
What soil to select—How to manure and
prepare it—The best soil—Onions on muck—
Sandy loam—Clean soil essential—Manuring
the land—An onion and strawberry combina-
tion—Preparing the soil.
CHAPTER IiIl
A Drrricutty Eastry Overcome. How the plants
are set in open ground é ‘ ; .
The real work—One advantage of trans-
planting—Width of planting—Marking the land
—Trimming the plants before setting—Setting
plants—Planting machines.
CHAPTER IV
PERSEVERANCE THaT Pays. Tillage as moisture pre-
server and weed killer : ‘ e ‘
Objects of cultivation—Tools of tillage—
Hand weeding—Mulching—Irrigation.
13
21
Vili CONTENTS
CHAPTER V
A Timety Putt anp Haut. When and how to. har-
vest the crop
Danger in delay—Signs of maturity—Curing
Re crop—Curing sheds—An onion storage
ouse.
CHAPTER VI
THE FRAGRANT BULB ON SALE
The Prizetaker a Pricetaker—An "inventory
—Crating onions—The crates — Wintering
onions.
CHAPTER VII
Auu’s Wett THAat Enps WELL .
Advantages and profits of the new way—Five
advantages of the new method— Estimate of.
cost and profits.
CHAPTER VIII
THE OLp ONION CULTURE
Sowing seed in the open ground—Drilling
in the seed—After culture—Buying seed—
Onions for pickling—Growing sets.
CHAPTER IX
Sorts AND MANuRES FoR ONIONS 5 a Z ;
CHAPTER X
ONION VARIETIES . i ‘ bs ; ;
CHAPTER XI
INSECTS AND DISEASES AFFECTING THE ONION CROP
CHAPTER XII
ONION GROWING IN THE SOUTH . - athe .
BIBLIOGRAPHY A ni 4 F - é FA Ss
CoNcLUSION . ‘ a ‘ He ; ‘ . :
51
55
75
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Frontispiece—The Author
The Story of the New Onion —— ‘
Yellow Prizetaker Onion ‘ ae
Plants Ready for bet ag
Hotbed in Sunken Pit .
Hotbed on Level Ground
Forcing Pit Covered with Hotbed Sash-
Small Greenhouse—Elevation
Small Greenhouse—Cross Section .
A Well-Prepared Seed Bed .
A Perfect Crop of Gibraltar Onions
Row of Scallions ;
Onions in the New Strawberry Bed
Disk Harrow
Acme Harrow
Meeker Smoothing Harrow
Old Style Garden Marker : ;
Single Tooth Attachment ; ete i
Three-Tooth Marker :
Tracing Wheel Marker .
Setting the Plants with Dibber
Old Kitchen Knife as Dibber . '
jee, So eg lake ENE Seat
Dibber . 4 ;
Trimming the Plants. : : °
Wrong Way . ‘ . . ‘
Right Way j ‘
Plant Set Right Depth rare art
Plant Set Too Deep Fi =
Iron Age Hand Wheel Hoe .
Wheel Hoe in Operation in the Onion Field
Single Wheel Hoe . s
Lang’s Hand Weeder : ue Se
Homemade Onion Hoe . . . .
Onion Curing Shed . ! ‘
An Onion Curing Crib .
Michigan Onion Storage House
Bunch of Prizetaker Onions
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ILLUSTRATIONS
Prizetaker Onions Crated for Market
Iron Age Garden Drill in Operation
Comparative Size of Round Onions
Comparative Size of Flat Onions
Homemade Pickling Onion Sieve
Assorted Barletta Onions
Egyptian or Perennial Tree Onion
Onion Field in Bloom ‘
Onion Seed Ready for Harvesting
Potato Onion or Multiplier
Large Red Wethersfield
White Tripoli Onion F
Beauliew’s Hardy White Onion
The Onion Maggot .
Plant Attacked by Thrips
6.2 -e "6" @7- 6 8 es
in oe Te Scot ae Re
PREFACE
In bringing this revised and enlarged treatise on
the new way of growing onions by the method which
has become famous under the name “new onion cul-
ture” before the public, the author makes no pretense
of believing that there is a lack of literature on the
subject of onion culture in America. On the contrary,
he willingly and freely concedes that all phases of the
culture of this vegetable have found a most liberal
consideration at the hands of the writers of books,
pamphlets, bulletins and agricultural newspaper arti-
cles. The author himself has been guilty of adding
largely to the mass of printed matter on onions. All
this, however, together with the large sales which most
of the more popular treatises on onion growing have
met with right along, only proves the great importance
of the subject.
The first edition of The New Onion Culture was
issued in the spring of 1891, and had to be followed
by new editions in rapid succession to meet the unex-
pected demand; yet this demand still continues. No
further excuse will therefore be offered for this attempt
to take the subject in hand once more, and to bring the
“new onion culture’ into renewed and thoroughly
up-to-date form.
Many hundreds of experiment station and de-
partment bulletins and reports on the onion have been
issued, a list of which will be given later on. A veg-
ai
xii PREFACE
etable that has commanded so much and so long
continued intense attention, cannot be without great
merit, nor without unusual promise as a profitable
crop. True, the onion has often been looked upon as
the pariah among vegetables. Yet the great majority
of people are inordinately fond of onion flavor, even
if some try to hide their liking for it as if they were
ashamed of it. As a money crop, too, the despised
onion occupies a front rank. Its annual production
in the United States runs high up into the millions of
bushels. The importations, especially of the large
sweet or Spanish type of onions during spring and
early summer, also represent a large figure, reaching
sometimes close to the million-bushel mark for the year.
My own earlier interest in onion growing was
revived by the introduction, in 1889, of the Prizetaker
onion, a variety of that large and very mild Spanish
type which we now import in still considerable quan-
tities from abroad. The bulbs, in my (then) New
Jersey sandy loam grew so beautiful and perfect, and
of such large size (although grown by the old method,
from seed sown in open ground in spring), that I
became really enthusiastic about the possibilities hidden
in the crop. In my further experiments with this
novelty, I stumbled, in 1890, upon the method now
generally known as “the new onion culture.”
The new plan may now be safely said to have
passed the experimental stage. It has stood the ordeal
of a dozen years of trial, and sometimes of hostile
criticism or prejudice. But it has slowly made its
way into favor with those growers who understand its
scope and purport, and has made money for them.
Already in 1893 I quoted from a letter then just
received from Mr A. I. Root of Medina, Ohio, the
publisher of Gleanings in Bee Culture, and himself
known as an enthusiastic gardener, as follows, viz:—
ee On Sa eee
ee eT See oe
: ie | itty es Ao pei epi Sure Me Oi ak Seattle ede
PREFACE xiii
“In regard to new points in vegetable gardening
during the past season, I believe what has been called
‘the new onion culture’ has made the most stir. At
one of the farmers’ institutes, I gave them a talk on
the matter and exhibited some samples of large, fine
Spanish onions. After I got through I felt a little
afraid my talk had been pretty extravagant, and some
of my hearers, I was told, criticised me a good deal.
They said, ‘Oh, yes, Root can talk, especially when
he buys manure from the livery stables, and puts on
more of it to the acre than an acre of our ground is
worth ; but what good does such talk do us?’
“You may perhaps surmise there were some among
my hearers of the class that claim ‘farming don’t pay.’
Well, a few days ago, a man I had seen a few times,
came into the office and said he had something down
stairs for me to look at. On the way down he asked
if I remembered my talk in the winter. Then he said
he had bought some seed, and had been at work trying
the new onion culture. I felt afraid he had failed,
and was going to blame me for my enthusiastic state-
ments of what might be done’on a single acre. By
this time we reached the place where he had left his
basket of onions. They were just beauties, and you
ought to have seen his face while he held them up and
told me how he did it. He hadn’t any greenhouse nor
hotbed, so he raised the plants in boxes in the kitchen
window, and planted them out in ordinary clay soil
such as farmers use for corn and potatoes. I asked
him if he had found a market for them, and he replied:
“Why, bless your heart, Mr Root, there isn’t any
trouble at all about the market. My neighbors right
around me will take every last onion at one dollar per
bushel, and I just wanted to see you, and tell that you
wasn’t extravagant a bit in telling what a farmer might
do if he had only the will to do it.’
xiv PREFACE
“Another man in the same neighborhood raised a
wagon load in the same way, and brought them to
Medina, and sold them at once for eighty cents per
bushel at a time when ordinary onions were bringing
thirty cents per bushel.”
I might tell a good many instances of a similar
kind from my experiences during the past few years.
It is generally found, that if the trial is made properly,
and under circumstances not exactly unfavorable, the
result will be such as to make anyone with a natural
instinct for gardening, just as much of an enthusiast
as the man in Mr Root’s story.
After a full baker’s dozen years of experience in
growing onions by the new system, I am still in doubt
whether to recommend it for general purposes of onion
growing or not. Theoretically I see no objection to
the substitution of the new for the old way even for
the production of the crop of ordinary onion varieties
for fall and winter use. The fact is to-day recognized
by all authorities, and stands without dispute, that
every one of our common onion sorts gives much
larger individual bulbs when the seedlings are started
early under glass than when seed is sown in open
ground in spring, as is the practice of the old style.
The crop is easily twice, possibly three and more times
as large.
Farmers’ Bulletin 39, issued by the United States
department of agriculture in 1896, says: ‘“Experi-
ments have demonstrated that the transplanting system
has many advantages, the most important of which is,
perhaps, the increase in yield. This increase is due to
several causes. The plants receive a good start under
glass before they are set in the field, and thus have the
full advantage of the cool spring weather, which is
most favorable to rapid growth; when sown in the
field, a month or more is consumed before the plants
¢ PREFACE XV.
are fairly started. This is a very important consider-
ation in the South, where the hot, dry weather may
arrive very soon. Transplanting, if properly per-
formed, always secures a full stand, which is uncertain
where the seed is sown in open ground. Pulling the
plants results in more or less root pruning, and this
doubtless exerts some beneficial influence on the yield.
“Experiments at many agricultural experiment
stations show how material is the increased yield. At
the Ohio station ten selected transplanted Prizetaker
bulbs weighed eight pounds and four ounces; the same
number of bulbs, not transplanted, four pounds and
four ounces ; Pompeii, transplanted, seven pounds and
six ounces; not transplanted, four pounds and one
ounce; White Victoria, transplanted, eight pounds and
six ounces; not transplanted, three pounds and seven
ounces ; Yellow Danvers, transplanted, five pounds ; not
transplanted, two pounds and six ounces. Trans-
planting gave a decided increase with each of the
fourteen varieties tried, amounting to one hundred per
cent in some cases.
“At the Michigan station transplanted Prizetaker
onions gave a yield of 548 bushels per acre, while
bulbs not transplanted yielded only 216 bushels;
Southport, transplanted, 296 bushels per acre; not
transplanted, 172; Giant Rocca, transplanted, 556 bush-
els; not trarisplanted, 110. Experiments at the Rhode
Island station gave a decided increase with Yellow
Danvers, Red Wethersfield and White Portugal. Red
Wethersfield onions transplanted at the Tennessee
station yielded 823 bushels per acre, while those not
transplanted produced at the rate of 206 bushels.
North Dakota station reports experiments with several
varieties, including Yellow Danvers, in which trans-
planted onions gave an increase from four to five times
vi PREFACE
as great as those not transplanted. This enormous
increase in North Dakota is due to the abundance of
rain during the early spring.”
In practice, the large growers of fall and winter
onions in the great onion growing sections of the New
England states, New York, Ohio, Michigan, etc, have
been reluctant to make the change in their methods.
For myself, I will confess, that if I had an ideal onion
soil, and were growing standard varieties for fall and
winter market, the Yellow Danvers, Yellow or White
Globes, etc, I am not even now prepared to say that I
would not grow them by the old plan, and I am dis-
posed to leave the choice between the old and the new
to each individual grower according to his particular
circumstances and surroundings, and possibly personal
notions and preferences.
My own soil is not particularly suited to the ordi-
nary onion crop. Try as I may, I am unable to grow
a respectable crop of Yellow Danvers or Southport
Globes, the leading varieties of that class, in the old
way. ‘The yield, 200 or 250 bushels per acre, is below
the profit limit. For this reason I had to devise or
adapt a system of my own to make onion growing
profitable. I found it in the new onion culture.
Its chief purpose is to enable me to grow very
large specimens, and a very large yield, of the very
mild onions of the sweet Spanish type. . Americans
may not think much of the Spaniards, as a nation; but
they like the mild flavor of their onions. Hundreds of
thousands of bushels of onions are annually imported
into the United States from Bermuda (the old crop
during January), from Cuba (new crop during Febru-
ary), from France and Spain (during February,
March, and up to midsummer). Various portions of
our country have the right climate and soil to raise
feeder
PREFACE Xvii
just as good onions as any coming from foreign
countries. ;
The retail customers of our grocery stores are
asked to pay five, six or seven cents a pound for the
imported “Spanish” onion. During summer, fall and
part or all of the winter, the home-grown “Spanish,”
Gibraltar and Prizetaker, onions can be sold by grocers
at a profit at three cents a pound, and allow one dollar
a bushel for the grower. I can see no sense, on the
part of the retail buyer, in paying the price asked for
the imported article, or of importing the real Spanish
onions and offering them for sale, while the home-
grown “Spanish” onion, which is in every way the equal
of the other, can be had. I would like to see the
imported bulb crowded out of our markets, at least to
some extent. It can be done by making use of “the new
onion culture,” and of the fine varieties of onions of
the Spanish type which we now possess in the Prize-
taker and Gibraltar.
The only problem which remains for us to solve is
that of keeping the large sweet bulbs of this class until
spring or early summer, whether this be done by means
of putting in cold storage, or of exposing to the fumes
of burning sulphur, or in other ways, at which times
they would find ready sale at possibly twice the prices
obtainable for them in the fall.
The new plan of onion growing can be justly and
earnestly recommended for four special purposes, viz:
I. For the production of a full home supply of
the very finest and largest onions; and, especially to
the novice, as the very easiest way of securing most
desirable results.
2. For growing exhibition onions that will be
sure to take the prizes at any fair in competition with
onions grown in the ordinary way.
XVili PREFACE
3. For market gardeners who deal directly with
retail customers and can work off a lot of really choice
sweet onions in smaller quantities at high prices with
their other crops.
4. As a means to interest your boy or boys in
gardening operations and making them enthusiasts in
the business.
Try the new onion culture on any of these lines.
If you do your part only reasonably well, your highest
success will be assured.
T. GREINEk.
La Salle, N Y, 1903.
Tea eee eee
THE WHYS AND WHEREFORES
A SORT OF INTRODUCTION
“If I were a tailor, I’d made it my pride
The best of all tailors to be;
If I were a tinker, no tinker beside
Should mend a tin kettle like me.”
Who has never met the “Jack-of-all-trades”—
knowing a little of all, and being proficient in none—
a clever sort of person, and handy to have around as
a “general utility” man, but never rising above the level
of mediocrity in anything, or able to aspire to great
things, or to command large pay! The man who
excels, even in a seemingly unimportant specialty, is
the one who will achieve a brilliant success, and get
big pay for his work.
Some of my readers undoubtedly have heard, or
read, the old fable of the fox and the cat. The story,
like other fables, has a moral, and is worth repeating.
The two animals met in the woods, when the voices
of hounds were heard in the distance.
“Poor pussy,” said the fox, “what will you do
when the dogs get after you?”
“T know a trick,” replied the cat, “and am not
alarmed.”
The hounds, in the meantime, had come pretty
close, and conversation was brought to a stop. The
xix
xx THE WHYS AND WHEREFORES
fox sped through woods, and fields, and meadows,
playing one trick after another, in the vain attempt to
throw the hounds off the scent. The _ pursuers.
remained on his track, and finally overtook and
grabbed him,
In his dying moments he looked up and saw the
cat in the top of a tree, safe from harm. “Your one
trick is worth more than my whole bagful,” sighed he,
and expired.
Many farmers are situated pretty much like th
fox in the fable. They have a whole bagful of tricks
by which they hope to escape the usurer and the
sheriff. They raise a little wheat, and a little oats, a
few potatoes, a little hops, some berries, a few hogs, or
a cow, a horse, etc, things which often cost them one
dollar and a quarter for every dollar they get for them.
They try one trick after another, or two or three at a
time, changing from one thing to another; and the
harder they try, the harder they find themselves
pressed, and at last—pity ’tis, ’tis true—in only too
many cases they meet a fate somewhat like the fox’s.
The whole bagful of ordinary tricks does not save
them ; but the one special cat’s trick of climbing up to
the top of the tree or ladder will never fail to give a
way of escape. To rise above the heads of the crowd—
that is the trick worth knowing. Learn the one trick
well, and you'll be safe.
What I wish to do in this little work, is to tell of a
genuine cat’s trick which I have recently discovered—
the trick of climbing up to the top in onion culture.
To grow larger and better bulbs, and more bushels on a
given area, than anybody else, has always been my aim
as an onion grower. Yet it would be a rash move for
me to defy the competition of growers anywhere who
have learned and adopted my methods. This is a case
THE WHYS AND WHEREFORES xX1
where the scholar may easily get bigger than his
teacher.
The new trick or “secret” in onion growing elimi-
nates almost every element of uncertainty from the
whole business, and gives to even the novice such ad-
vantages that experienced growers, and may they live
in the favored climate of California, would not stand
the ghost of a chance in competition against him for
the best crop, so long as they practice only the ordinary
old method.
It’s mere child’s play for me, or anybody that fol-
lows my new plan, to grow twice as many onions on an
acre as professional growers do under the old method,
and to send bulbs to market over which the commis-
sion merchants, and the storekeepers, and consumers
themselves, can grow enthusiastic; bulbs, too, which
are readily selling for seventy-five cents a bushel, when
ordinary onions bring fifty cents.
If I had been shrewd enough to keep the matter
to myself, and work it for all it is worth, I might make
a nice round sum of money by a discretion which, as
usual, is the better part of valor. But it isn’t my
nature. I have to give the whole thing away, and
teach my would-be competitors the ways in which they,
if their soil conditions are more favorable than mine,
can easily beat me. So I shall at least not be open to
the charge of taking an unfair advantage over them.
But, if I cannot be the best of all growers, I will at .
least try
* * * * *
The best of all teachers to be.
It may be of interest to some of the readers to
learn the history of the new onion culture. It was in
1888 when a new variety of the large “Spanish” type of
XXii THE WHYS AND WHEREFORES
onions was introduced under the name of “Prizetaker.”
At that time I had the advantage of the use of as fine
onion land as the sun ever shone upon, a fairly fertile
soil in Monmouth county, New Jersey. I always
made it a practice to test all promising novelties. The
Prizetaker onion was one of them. It was one of the
comparatively few novelties which have lasting value.
It was above all others the one which made the testing
of novelties so profitable. I could better have afforded
to pay $500 or even $1000 for this test of the Prize-
taker onion, than miss the chance to invent “the new
onion culture.” This is mentioned, to prove, em
passant, the practical value of novelty tests in general.
In short, even the first test of the Prizetaker onion,
although grown in the old way, by sowing seed in
open ground in early spring, resulted eminently satis-
factorily. In the fall of that year I had the prettiest,
most perfect onions, of reasonably large size, imag-
inable, and I became so enthusiastic over this novelty,
that I then described the new variety in agricultural
papers as “the king of all onions.”
Even the next year, in 1889, seed could only be
obtained in very small quantities, and this at high
prices. In order to make every seed count, and know-
ing how easily onions can be transplanted, I sowed the
seed in hotbed in March, and transplanted to open
ground early in May.
The results were again so gratifying, the bulbs so
large and attractive, and their quality so much admired
by all who had a chance to test them, that acquaintances
and neighbors were infected with my enthusiasm about
the new onion and the new way of growing it. Among
them was a lad of fifteen or sixteen summers, with
same yearning for pocket money which we expect to
be the natural inheritance of all other boys. The ap-
parent ease with which these large and salable bulbs
THE WHYS AND WHEREFORES XXiii
“were produced, appealed with tempting and irresist-
ible force to the lad’s mind. Finally he came to me
with a proposition. He must try to grow a larger
patch for himself.
There is no surer way to interest a boy in a certain
task, and start him in the right way and in the habit of
doing good work, than by letting him know he is to
receive a share, or possibly the whole of the proceeds
from his own efforts. There is nothing that will dis-
courage a boy more quickly than lack of good faith on
the parent’s side. Don’t make it the boy’s calf and
the father’s cow.
A prominent seedsman that spring offered a prize
of $50 for the best crop grown from one ounce of
Prizetaker seed. That was an extra inducement, so
the lad got the ounce of seed and sowed it in coldframe
early in April, transplanted the seedlings to open
ground in May, and raised a crop amounting to a
plump ton of nice onions which might have taken the
prize for largest yield but for the competition by
growers in California. As it was, the chief purpose
was accomplished, namely to put a good lot of pocket
money into the lad’s possession. It is safe to promise
similar results to any boy for similar efforts.
The experience of these three seasons had now
firmly and permanently established the practice of
growing the onions of the Spanish type by the new or
transplanting method. It now only remained to im-
prove and systematize this new way, and to bring it
before the public for more or less general adoption.
The first edition of The New Onion Culture came out
in the spring of 1891, and made considerable stir
among American gardeners. Ever since that time my
efforts for the further improvement and simplification
of the new method have been continued, apparently
with good success. The pages of the little book now
XXIV, “THE WHYS AND WHEREFORES
before the reader, which is an entirely new work, give
evidence of the progress that has been made, and con-
tain all the information about the new plan now
available.
I claim some credit for the discovery of this novel
method. Still I admit I am not the first person who
transplants onions. On a small scale, specimens have
been grown in England in a similar way for exhibition ;
various growers have for generations employed the
transplanting process for filling out gaps in their onion
rows ; and others have practiced a plan almost identical
with mine in growing early onions for bunching. But
to apply the principle to field culture, to reduce the
crude plan to a system, and to practice, advocate and
teach it in advance of all others—that, I claim, is my
merit.
Professor W. J. Green, of the Ohio experiment
station, has worked out this same problem, simul-
taneously with me, but entirely independently. Nei-
ther of us knew that the other was following the same
track. The first, though brief, description of the novel
method appeared in How to Make the Garden Pay,
written by me in autumn, 1889, and published at
the beginning of 1890. Professor Green, soon after,
gave his version of the new onion culture in a bulletin
issued by the Ohio experiment station, and since then
the new method has been the subject of innumerable
newspaper articles, notices in bulletins and in agricul-
tural books.
In my attempts to reach a maximum crop, I have
often met difficulties which many other growers will
not have to face. For a long time the privilege of
selecting ideal conditions of soil and locality for my
operations had been withheld from me, and I have
had to make the best of circumstances and surround-
ings in which I happened to be placed by accident or
THE WHYS AND WHEREFCRES XXV
otherwise. Yet-adverse circumstances have not been
able to discourage me, and there is no need of anybody
giving up in despair merely because the conditions at
his disposal are not the most favorable. By discreet
management, one can do pretty well even if things do
not happen to be just as one would like to have them.
It is perfectly feasible, perfectly practicable, to
grow onions by this new plan even on rented land. Yet
I believe I would rather live in a hut, surrounded by a
few acres of land, all my own, and be able to say,
“Jy suis, jy reste’ (here I am and here I stay) than
live in a rented palace. No matter how poor or defect-
ive the land, by a little effort here and there, and by
little additions now and then, the land can be brought
up to the highest state of fertility and cultivation in a
few years, and the humble house can gradually be
transformed into an earthly paradise, and all this with-
out much actual expense, or conscious effort. This
course surely will prove more gratifying than to oper-
ate on rented land, to make improvements from year
to year, and after a short period of occupancy turn the
whole over to somebody else, and let others enjoy the
benefits from the former occupants’ labors and pains-
taking. But in whatever situation in this respect you
may find yourself, do as I always have tried to do,
namely, make the most of your opportunities.
Have I any doubt that Prizetaker and Gibraltar
onions may be grown in this way by one, two, three or
four acres with a profit? No, not the least. But this
book is not written for the purpose of getting the
reader wild on the subject, and into trouble. It is
written primarily for the purpose of inducing you to
make some careful trials of the new onion culture,
operating at first on a small fraction of an acre of care-
fully selected land, to enable you to learn not only how
to. grow the onions, but also how to exchange them for
XXV1 THE WHYS AND WHEREFORES
cash after they are grown. Then my responsibility
ceases. If you then conclude to grow these onions by
the acre or acres, you do it at your own risk and pre-
sumably with full knowledge of what you are doing.
I had still another object in view in writing this
onion story. What was done by the lad already men-
tioned, in this case, can be done by any wide-awake
youngster of ordinary intelligence. The new onion
culture points out or opens an easy way to him of earn-
ing a little pocket money of his own, and of growing
a crop of which he may be proud, and which will take
the prize at horticultural fairs, securing a little addi-
tional reward, notwithstanding the competition of the
old experienced onion grower who works only on the
old plan.
And what a chance for horticultural schooling and
training this affords besides! Can there be a better
opportunity for awakening your boy’s interest in horti-
cultural matters and making him study up horticultural
problems for himself, than by putting a copy of this
book, and an ounce or two of Prizetaker or Gibraltar
onion seed into his hands, and a few square rods of
good land at his disposal for a start, and then tell him:
“Go ahead and see what you can do.”
ee ae ee
THE NEW
ONION CULTURE
CHAPTER I
Well Begun—Half Done
HOW THE PLANTS ARE GROWN
Our aim always is and must be for a prize crop—
for specimens so large and fine that we can expect the
first prize at any fair, and are sure of top prices in any
market. In this an early start is the chief condition of
full success. Without it the undertaking is not well
begun; with it, it is really more than half done. This
includes all reasonable care in procuring the needed
supply of seed in good time. We try to begin sowing
seed just as soon after January first as we can get a
spot for it in the greenhouse or a hotbed. I usually
have the best success from plants started along in Jan-
uary or not later than early in February. Yet I have
grown fine crops from seed sown as late as first week
in April. It depends somewhat on the season, but the
earlier sowings ordinarily will give the best crops.
Some of my onion growing friends grow their
own Prizetaker onion seed, which is not a particularly
difficult matter, and insures the possession of the seed
whenever they wish to sow it. I frequently have
found difficulty in securing seed, especially of the
2 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
Gibraltar onion, early enough for sowing in the green-
house when I most desired to sow, namely in January.
Sound, medium-sized Prizetakers are easily kept over
winter, and may be planted out about September first
or next spring, in furrows six inches deep and five or
six inches apart, in soil of medium fertility for seed
production. When most of the seeds in a head are ripe,
the head is cut off and put away in a dry and airy spot,
to dry, and the seed then thrashed out atsu properly
cleaned.
Fig 3—YELLOW PRIZETAKER ONION
When we depend on the seedsman for our supply,
however, the order must be given in good season so
that the seeds will be on hand when needed. Only two
varieties come in consideration with me, the Yellow
Prizetaker (Fig 3) and the Gibraltar onions. At pres-
ent there is little demand for red onions of any kind,
and for the pink (or red) Prizetaker no more than for
Wethersfield or Red Globe. The yellow sorts are the
HOW THE PLANTS ARE GROWN 3
ones that are wanted. For experiment you may plant
any other sort or sorts that you care about.
In a small way, plants may be raised in boxes (so-
called flats) placed in a kitchen window. A flat ten by
eighteen inches will give plants enough for a full
family supply of fine onions. Such a box should be
about four inches deep, and be filled with very rich,
clean soil, or with rich compost covered about an inch
deep with clean sand. Plants raised in flat, ready for
transplanting, are seen in Fig 4.
Fig 4—PLANTS READY FOR TRANSPLANTING
The great majority of gardeners have no green-
house facilities. They must make use of hotbeds. For
operations during February or March, at least in a
northern climate, cold frames will not answer; nor will
muslin covering. Common hotbed sash is the neces-
sary thing to cover hotbeds at this time.
There are two ways of constructing a hotbed; one
_ by digging a pit and filling this with a two-foot layer
of fresh and fermentirg horse manure, as shown in
Fig 5; another by piling this manure layer directly
upon the ground, a frame corresponding with the size
and desired number of hotbed sashes to be placed in
4 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
either case upon the manure, and then filled with pre-
pared “hotbed” soil, as shown in Fig 6.
It is only for a southern location, or for very late
planting at the North, that an ordinary cold frame
may be made to answer. This is a simple box of
boards or planks, slanting from the rear, where it is
about twelve inches high, to front, where it is only six
to eight inches high. This box is set directly upon the
ground in some well-drained and well-protected sunny
spot, facing south or southeast. It is then filled with
—s .
Fig 5—HOTBED IN SUNKEN PIT
a mixture of good turfy loam, sand, and a little fine
old compost to about four inches from the top. Ordi-
nary rich garden soil, freed from stones and rubbish
by sifting, and further enriched with fine old compost,
well mixed and sifted together, will also answer every
purpose. The surface is made fine and smooth with a
steel rake, and marked off with straight furrows from
front to rear. They are easily drawn across with the
handle of the rake, or with a little stick, or even the
finger, and should be about an inch deep, and about
one and a half inches apart, or as close as they can be
made conveniently.
HOTBEDS 5
I sow about-one and a half ounces of seed on the
space covered by a single sash frame, which is usually
three feet by six or nearly that, and expect from it
from 5000 to 8000 plants. To grow the 120,000 plants
required for a one-acre patch would therefore call for
the use of a frame of not less than nearly twenty
sashes.
The seed is to be evenly scattered into the furrows,
and the latter carefully filled in again with the hand.
The soil is then well firmed by pressing a piece of
board or block of wood down upon it. The sash or
sashes are then put on, and the bed left pretty much
Fig 6—HOTBED ON LEVEL GROUND
to itself, except giving air on fine days, and an occa-
sional thorough watering when the soil seems to
become very dry. In eight weeks, more or less, the
plants will be ready for transfer to open ground.
Personally, I am getting to be more and more in
favor of greenhouses for growing plants of any kind,
and of onion plants in particular. We have to start
onion plants early—earlier, really, than it is conven-
ient to make and operate hotbeds, unless the latter are
heated by an ordinary flue, or, still better, by the
waste steam of factories.
A so-called fire hotbed (one heated by a flue) is a
rather simple affair, and easily and cheaply put up
6 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
when you have the needed sashes at command. Select
a well-drained and well-protected spot for the bed.
If possible, it should slightly slope to north or south.
Dig a pit at lowest end for a simple furnace, and with
a few firebrick, some grate bars, and an iron door,
build a fireplace. The flue should run under the center
of the bed, ending in a chimney at the upper end.
The hotbed itself is a simple frame, with a scantling
as a ridgepole, say two feet above the ground, and a
line of ten or twelve-inch plank on each side. The two
rows of sashes, resting on light rafters, and meeting
over the ridgepole, form a kind of a gable roof over |
the bed.
This arrangement, of course, is simply a modified
hotbed.’ The operator has to get at his work in open
air, by raising or removing sashes, as in ordinary hot-
beds. Still he has this advantage, that he can control
the bottom heat. Whenever he gets ready, and no
matter how hard the ground may be frozen, he can
start up his fire, and soon get the bed in shape for
planting. If you have an opportunity to use waste
steam, you should consider yourself especially for-
tunate. You may be able to conduct it into lines of
two-inch tiles laid right under the frames, and thus
secure a reliable and controllable medium of heating
your plant beds at smallest expense. It is a chance
too good to be neglected.
But there is nothing to hinder you from utilizing
.this same waste steam in greenhouse heating; and if
you have the sashes anyway, you can put one up quite
cheaply. In the absence of waste steam, a simple flue
might be made to answer. The illustration will give
you an idea of the construction of building. Put up a
simple frame, three-quarters span, and board up at
the sides and back. Better have these walls double,
and well lined with paper, or the space filled with dry
FORCING PITS 7
sawdust. Three rows of ordinary hotbed sashes form
the roof. The flue is situated as shown in Fig,7, and
heated from a fireplace constructed as described for
the fire hotbed. There is no need of going further
into the details. I will only call attention to some of
the advantages of this plan.
In the first place, there is next to no money outlay
required for it. The few boards and scantling needed
for the frame can be found on almost any place, or
ean be had for little money. Anybody of ordinary
intelligence and mechanical skill can put up the frame.
Fig 7—FORCING PIT, COVERED WITH HOTBED SASHES
A few of the sashes can be hinged, to serve for venti-
lation. You can do all the work of running this half-
and-half arrangement under shelter and with comfort.
The flue being on one side gives a chance to raise all
the different vegetable plants. The high bed furthest
back, over the flue, will be the warmest. Here you
can start tomato, pepper and egg plants, etc, or use it
for forcing cucumbers, tomatoes, etc. The next bed,
in the center, which is somewhat cooler, may be used
for tomato, pepper, early cabbage and similar plants
after they are well started, also for forcing lettuce,
radishes, etc. The bed on the ground level is the
coolest and just right for growing onion plants.
8 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
A building of this kind is much better and handier
—and cheaper in the end, because more satisfactory
and more prolific of results—than ordinary hotbeds.
If you are not afraid to invest an extra one hundred
dollars or so, better put in a hot water heater, with the
necessary pipes. The house will be managed with
one-half the labor, and double the satisfaction.
A neat little greenhouse well suited to the needs of
the small grower and amateur, is shown in Figs 8 and
g. It is a double-span house, a little more costly than
the other, but extremely convenient, and fit for raising
a 5 Ce eu
os ee ee er eee
Sa ee 5 ew
Fig 8—SMALL GREENHOUSE—ELEVATION
any kind of vegetable or flower plants, or forcing any
kind of ordinary vegetable. The pit for the heater
is dug at the north end of one of the spans. If I
build another, however, I should have only one span
of double the length.
Many other styles of greenhouses might be men-
tioned. Some growers who have a lot of hotbed sash
available for the purpose will wish to put up a cheap
structure and utilize their stock of sashes for the roof.
A house of this kind does not cost much, and with a
little ingenuity and good management may be made
to answer any purpose of an onion plant nursery.
It should be remembered that onion plants are quite
‘sili ht AE RS a
Fe eS Cy, a ee oe eet en ee Ba
SMALL GREENHOUSES 9
hardy. They are not injured by a light frost, nor by
extremes of temperature or sudden changes, nor by a
direct transfer from greenhouse to open air conditions
without previous hardening off. It is true, however,
that we can force more rapid growth at a compara-
tively high temperature, ranging say between sixty
and ninety or more degrees Fahrenheit, than in a
much lower one.
One of my friends, near a neighboring city, who
has grown several acres of Prizetakers on the new
plan yearly for several years, has taken another course
to secure his hundreds of thousands of plants. In his
Vicinity lives a party who makes a business of growing
2
2
<5
?
poe Cee lL ee ong)
. Fessee
RES a Site
" neel| Vf Up . | L[ec0e
Fig 9Q—SMALL GREENHOUSE—CROSS SECTION ;
annually a million or two of tomato plants under con-
tract for some large canning houses which supply the
plants to their tomato growers. Some of the green-
houses in which these plants are grown usually stand
empty until nearly the time that onions can be taken
off the benches and set in open ground. A crop of
onion plants may here be produced just as well as not,
and with but slight additional expense. So my friend
contracts for his plants with these tomato plant grow-
ers with profit to both parties in the transaction.
In my own little greenhouse I have for many years
done exactly as these professional plant growers do,
namely, have grown my onion plants during the win-
10 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
ter; and when the benches were cleared from them in
April, filled the vacant spaces up with tomato, egg and
pepper plants just as fast as there was a chance. Thus
I make the best use of my available bench room.
Often there is considerable call for Prizetaker
onion plants in early spring, and even up to June.
The price usually asked for them ranges from fifty
cents to one dollar per thousand plants, and I am sure
that they can be grown at that figure at a good profit
where greenhouses are available, and possibly stand
idle anywhere during a part of that time.
In growing onion seedlings under glass I have
had to fight only one single enemy—and that is the
damping-off fungus. I have at times lost a consider-
able portion of my plants from this cause. The stem
appears to dwindle away near, usually just below, the
surface of the ground, and the top falls over and dries
away. The infection undoubtedly comes from the soil.
If we use new soil, or any soil that is free from the
fungus, the plants will remain healthy. Watering the
soil freely with a solution of copper sulphate, a pound
to two hundred gallons of water, has seemed to prevent
the loss of plants from this cause. An excessively
high temperature and a close, moist atmosphere should
be avoided, and the surface of the bed should never be
allowed to become dust dry. To provide for possible
loss caused by the disease, however, I practice and
advise. sowing seed rather thickly as already stated
(not less than one and one-half ounces to the space
covered by an ordinary hotbed sash). It is better to
be compelled to thin plants where too thick, than to
have large vacant spots in the bed.
It is possible, however, to prepare the seed bed in
such a manner that the fungus is entirely kept out.
For instance, I have used clear, sharp sand brought
fresh from the bank of the river, sowed the seed in
Fe ea ae ee ee
PREPARING THE SEED BED II
this, and then fed the plants entirely on liquid manure.
I have a cistern under one corner of the barn. The
rain water washes a good deal of pigeon manure off
the roof into this cistern. Then I add chemical ferti-
lizers, especially acid phosphate, muriate of potash and
a little nitrate of soda or potash, and find that by
ef 8 Ksjerer sy
Ske
- LAN =
TAOS
Fig I0—A WELL-PREPARED SEED BED
wateririg the onion beds copiously with this liquid,
I can force a very rapid growth in my seedlings.
Another safe plan is to fill the seed bed, bench,
frame or box pretty well up with good old compost,
or very rich soil well pressed down, and on top of this
to place a layer, an inch or inch and a half deep, of
clear, sharp river sand. The seed is sown into this
sand. The roots of the seedlings will soon get down
12 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
into the rich feeding grounds under the sand, and
produce a wonderfully thrifty and healthy growth, as
seen in Fig Io.
A further advantage of this method is that but
few weeds come up among the onion plants. If weeds —
appear, pull them up by hand. Where plants stand
overcrowded in the rows, thin, even severely, where
needed. The bed will require frequent and copious
watering. When the plants are making good growth,
during latter part of February and especially in the
sunshiny days of March, I give my onion seedlings
their regular daily soaking.
When standing as thickly in the beds as I want
them they are also sure to get top-heavy and will need
repeated and severe clipping. I usually cut them back
with a pair of common sheep shears, removing each
time nearly the full upper half (in length) of the
plant. Our aim is to get seedlings the bulb of which,
just above the roots, is between one-eighth and three-
sixteenths of an inch in diameter (if of nearly pencil
thickness, all the better), and this by the time that the
open ground is ready to receive them.
CHAPTER II
As You Make Your Bed, So You'll Lie
WHAT SOIL TO SELECT, HOW TO MANURE AND
PREPARE IT
“What spot would you advise me to select for
my onion patch?”
The inquirer had told me that he had a piece of
good loam, not excessively fertile, ‘tis true, but having
_ been cropped with carrots and beets the year before,
consequently quite clean, and in fair tilth, and of
course, wéll underdrained.
“That is the exact spot you want,” said I.
“Why not plant it on that deep, rich muck?”
came the next query.
“It is decidedly too loose and moist. The fine
Gibraltars and Prizetakers might all take a notion to
grow up thick-necked—romps, scallions, and worthless
for sale or keep. By all means take loam, sandy pre-
ferred, and if possible with good natural drainage, but
certainly not without thorough drainage of some kind.
Water should never stand on the surface of an onion
patch even for a single day.”
On the whole, however, I do not object to well-
drained, deep, rich muck. I myself have grown ex-
cellent crops, in the old way, on such soil, and once
I went through a several-acre patch in Mt Morris, .
N Y—soil being muck with a little sand mixed in,
and the land arranged for sub-irrigation—which had
an enormous crop of Yellow Danvers upon it, un-
doubtedly more than 1000 bushels per acre. It will
I4 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
be hard to find better onion soil than a well-drained,
well-subdued sandy muck.
With good plants, and an burly start, I would not
hesitate to set Prizetakers or Gibraltars on such well-
drained muck land. Small, poorly-grown plants, set
late in the season on moist muck soil that is exces-
sively rich in nitrogen and less abundantly supplied
with mineral plant foods, are liable, especially in a
wet season, to give you thick-necked, worthless onions,
and plants rather than bulbs. Sand and sandy loam,
however, favor this undesirable development much less
than other soils.
VET IVT TY yyy
}
} OOOO Ke We cy) Tl
Mi) 4
Fig 1I—A PERFECT CROP OF GIBRALTAR ONIONS
I wish to call especial attention to this fact, that
wherever plants of nearly pencil thickness were set
reasonably early in the season, the onions were large,
uniform and fine, without break in the row, and the
yield at a high acre rate. One of the finest crops of
perfect bulbs—of Gibraltars, Yellow and Pink Prize-
takers—that I ever grew, I secured last year on a clay
loam of only fair fertility, but having good drainage.
The season was excessively wet, especially in its earlier
part, and reports received by me showed that many
patches of onions of this type, all over the country,
produced little else but scallions. My patch had re-
ceived only a light dressing of old stable manure, but
a good dose of muriate of potash and acid phosphate,
WHAT SOIL TO SELECT 15
at the rate-of several hundred pounds each per acre,
applied broadcast just before the last harrowing. Such
an application seems always safe, in fact safer than
the use of excessive quantities of organic and nitrog-
enous manures, except on sandy soils.
Stimulated by the continuous and excessive rain-
fall of the earlier part of the season, the onion plants
showed some tendency to produce thick necks, and a
continuation of these abnormal conditions might have
spoiled the patch. But the rains finally ceased, recur-
ring only at reasonable intervals and just sufficiently
Fig 12—Row OF SCALLIONS
to provide a fair supply of moisture for healthy
growth. The outcome was a crop of onions which as
an average appeared as seen in Fig II in comparison
with scallions, Fig 12, the single specimens weighing
from three-fourths to one and one-half pounds apiece.
The soil must be free from stones and coarse
gravel, and rubbish of any kind, and as near as pos-
sible, also, from weed seeds. A new clover sod that
will pulverize nicely will do first rate; but if the sod
is old and tough, it would hardly be suitable for our
purpose shortly after being broken. A crop of pota-
toes, corn, beets, carrots, cabbages, etc, will get such a
sod land in admirable shape for a —— crop
of onions,
76 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
Whatever the soil, and in whatever condition, the
leavings of the preceding crop, coarse weed stalks,
etc, should be removed with great care before the plow
is struck in. All such rubbish interferes in a very
inconvenient manner with after-cultivation, and any
neglect in the proper preparation of the soil will be
greatly regretted later in the season.
This disposes of the problem what soil to select
for the onion crop. Now what about manure? Some
suggestions have already been given. I have usually
recommended greatest liberality in the use of all sorts
of manurial substances.
Fig I3—ONIONS IN THE NEW STRAWBERRY BED
“Put it on thick” is still my advice when we have
plenty of any kind of good compost that is reasonably
free from weed seeds, and the soil is of a rather sandy
nature. But if the latter is strong loam and very rich
already, or a loose rich muck, I feel that light dress-
ings of organic manures will do well enough, and may
be safer, the larger proportion of the plant foods to be
given in the form of standard chemicals, especially
plain superphosphate (such as dissolved South Carolina
rock) and muriate of potash, up to 500 pounds per
acre of the former and 200 or 250 pounds of the latter,
and an occasional light dressing, say 100 pounds, of
nitrate of soda if the plants seem to need it, that is,
WHAT MANURE TO USE 17 -
if they fail to make a thrifty succulent growth. These
applications of chemical manures, especially phosphate
and potash, I believe are always safe and will seldom
fail to show good results. Yet I do not wish to be
understood as asserting that good onion crops cannot
be grown without them. I have seen and grown ex-
cellent crops of fine solid bulbs on good soil manured
only with common barnyard or stockyard manure.
All sorts of domestic manures come acceptable for
onion growing—horse manure, cow manure, hog
2 a
Fig I4—DISK HARROW OR PULVERIZER
manure, sheep manure, poultry manure—or all sorts
of mixtures and composts, the finer the better. Poultry
manure is most excellent for onions, and there is no
need of being afraid of it. My way of managing it is
to scatter some dry soil, muck or sifted coal ashes
under the perches from time to time. Thus I obtain
a fine, dry, rich compost, and I would not hesitate to
put this inch-deep all over the ground if I could only
get enough of it for such a dressing. It brings the
onions every time. I usually apply it after the ground
is plowed in spring, mixing it with the surface soil by
thorough harrowing.
Besides these manures I would use everything else
18 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
I could get hold of in the shape of fertilizing ma-
terials, such as wood ashes, leached and unleached,
etc; but I should not use raw manure, and none not
reasonably free from weed seeds, as I: have already
stated.
For house use, and especially to secure a supply of
fine bulbs for the table during midsummer, I have
sometimes planted a lot of onion seedlings in the new
strawberry patch, in the manner illustrated in Fig 13.
I usually plant my strawberries rather farther
apart than most people. I lay off the rows four feet
apart, and set the plants three feet apart, and for such
Fig I5—ACME HARROW
inveterate plant-makers at Michel’s Early perhaps
even four feet apart in the rows. This leaves plenty
of vacant space between the plants, which may be
utilized to good advantage by setting half a dozen or a
dozen of onion plants between each two strawberry
plants in the row. Of course these onion plants are
pulled up early, sometimes even for green onions, and
in most cases before the tops have entirely died down,
so as to make room for the strawberry runners, which
in the latter part of the season try to occupy the entire
space in the rows. But I have grown as large and
solid onions in this manner, and this without extra
fussing and with less painstaking than in the regular
onion patch.
FOB CTD
HOW TO FIT THE LAND 19
HOW TO FIT THE LAND FOR THE ONION CROP
If at all practicable, I invariably try to plow the
land deeply and thoroughly during the fall previous,
leaving it in the rough and exposed to the benevolent
action of the weather, especially repeated freezing and
thawing. Fine manure in the desired quantity may
be applied any time during the winter or early spring
directly upon the plowed surface, or upon the snow
covering it.
While spring plowing may not be required on
mucky or loose loamy soils, I would not omit it if the
soil is packed hard by winter rains and snows, or if
Fig I16—MEEKER SMOOTHING HARROW
the manure applied is in the least coarse. Manure that
will not work up perfectly fine, and mixed with the
soil will not make a perfect seed bed, should be
plowed under.
On our own soils we have to use the disk har-
row or pulverizer (Fig 14) in order to get the land in
best condition. This cuts deep and works the ground
over very thoroughly. I prefer to use this first, then
follow with the Acme (Fig 15), which smooths the
surface that the disk has left somewhat ridged. In
the absence of an Acme, a common smoothing harrow
or drag will do very well. Should neither disk nor
Acme be at command, I would use a narrow-bladed
cultivator, such as the Planet Jr or Iron Age horse
hoe, or a spike-tooth cultiyator, stirring up the whole
20 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
surface, and thus mixing the compost with the soil in
a thorough manner.
The rich, fine sandy loams, or soils which, like
sandy muck, contain a large amount of organic matter
or humus, will not usually need so much manipulation.
The free use of an ordinary “drag” or smoothing
harrow after plowing will be all that is required to
get the surface reasonably smooth and fine. Chemical
manures, if to be used, may now be applied broadcast
or with a drill. Nitrate of soda only is to be with-
held for a while and for application later on.
To put the finishing touches on the land, I inva-
riably use the Meeker smoothing harrow (Fig 16).
In fact, I would hardly know how to get along without
it. This makes the surface about as even as could be
done by hand raking, and in one-tenth or one-twentieth
the work or time required for the latter operation.
The Meeker harrow costs twenty dollars or more, but
it is a great labor saver, and almost indispensable in
the market or farm garden. The ordinary steel rake,
however, is good enough for smaller patches. What-
ever tools you use, the surface should be as smooth as
a board, and the land is then ready for planting.
CHAPTER III
A Difficulty Easily Overcome
HOW THE PLANTS ARE SET IN THE GROUND
To transplant a few hundred onion plants is not a
formidable task, but when you set 120,000, covering an
acre, you have a big job on hand, and no mistake.
Indeed it is the work connected with my new onion
culture; all the rest of it is easy—mere child’s play, I
might say.
It takes about 120,000 plants to set an acre of
onions. I can get boys, that, with some practice, will
set 2000 to 3000 plants a day, and nimble-fingered per-
sons, used to garden work, will easily set 4000 or 5000.
The job of planting an acre is therefore equivalent to
probably not less than twenty-five days’ work, and in
some cases this estimate may be considerably exceeded ;
but the amount of thirty dollars should certainly be
enough to pay for the whole job, when we pay boys
fifty cents, and more experienced persons one dollar or
one dollar and a quarter for a good day’s work.
Transplanting so many onions may be a costly
operation, but it relieves us of much, if not all, hand
weeding, and entirely of the job of thinning. Old
onion growers know something about the tediousness
and costliness of these operations. The saving, in
these respects, more than pays for the labor of trans-
planting.
“How far apart shall I set the plants?” That is
the next thing the novice wants to know. I have for
years made the rows an even foot apart, and crowded
22 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
the plants as much as I dared to in the row, in the
attempt to secure the largest possible rate of yield.
My motto was: “No use wasting space and oppor-
tunity.” But I got over that notion. I find that I can
give the patch better attention, more thorough and
continued after-culture, if I make the rows fourteen
inches apart, and set Gibraltars four inches, and Prize-
takers not less than three inches apart in the rows.
It is only when I plant onion seedlings to be pulled
up early for green or bunching onions (and they are
admirable for that purpose) that I crowd them to
two inches in the row.
Fig 17—OLD STYLE GARDEN MARKER
For garden markers, we have almost up to this
time relied chiefly on homemade affairs, such as the
one shown in Fig 17. This has the one great disad-
vantage of compelling the operator to walk backward
or sideways. A set of handles might be attached at
the rear by which one person can do the steering while
another pulls it along horse-fashion. I now have dis-
carded this implement altogether.
For marking out the rows for onions in smaller
patches, up to one-eighth or even one-fourth acre,
I commonly use an Iron Age hand wheel hoe, fitting
it for that particular purpose by removing the side
hoes, and adjusting the single-tooth attachment shown
in Fig 18. With this I can make lighter or heavier
furrows, by bearing more or less heavily on the han-
MARKING THE ROWS 23
dles. It is especially useful for loosening up the soil
in the furrows when it has become somewhat hard or
packed. When simply marking out for setting the
plants, I take the regular marking attachment from
the drill, and put it on this tool. During the earlier
part of the season, or during the entire period of
setting onion plants, I keep one wheel-hoe fixed in
this manner right along, as then the time for using it
as a hoe has not yet arrived, and the marker is needed
about every day.
Gardeners who work with the Planet Jr combined
wheel-hoe and drill, may transform it into a three-
Fig 18—SINGLE TOOTH :
ATTACHMENT Fig IQ—THREE-TOOTH MARKER
tooth marker as suggested in Fig 19. If properly
made, it will give good service. I suggest still another
plan—simply an idea of my own. How would you
like a marker devised on the principle of the dress-
maker’s tracing wheel? I believe it can be pushed and
managed more easily than any other marker we have
yet mentioned. The little wheels may be turned from
hard wood. The construction is easy and so simple
that it will be unnecessary to give details. See Fig 20.
Straight and uniform rows add largely to the
attractiveness of the patch, even if they were not of
practical usefulness in facilitating the work of culti-
vating, and perhaps otherwise. Whatever marker we
24 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
use, therefore, we take the utmost pains to get the rows
perfectly straight. When we start in right once, the
rest is easy enough. Usually I get the first row in
straight line, if it is a rather long one, by setting
three stakes as a guide. We begin straight and try
to keep straight. It eases our conscience, and avoids
offense to the eye. I now mark only one way, leaving
it to the eye, to practice, and to good judgment, to
maintain the proper distance between the plants in
the row.
Fig 20—TRACING WHEEL MARKER
How is the planting done? In the first place it
should be remembered that plant setting, like seed
sowing, is always done most easily and most con-
veniently when the ground is freshly prepared. We
can then set nearly or fully twice as many plants in
the same length of time, as a few days later after
the ground has again become hard or packed down
by rains.
If the ground is freshly prepared, and as loose
and mellow as we should expect it under the circum-
stances, I prefer to set the plants with the fingers
alone, and without the use of a dibber. It is a simple
SETTING THE PLANTS 25
and quick operation, too, and for myself, I could, if
I wanted to keep at it, easily set 6000 plants in ten
working hours. I take hold of the plant with the
lef hand, place it with the root end just a trifle to the
right of the place where I wish to have it planted,
and then with the thumb or index finger of the right
hand press the bulb or lower end of the plant down
into the soft earth until it stands just where I want
it. This is the work of a very few seconds, and all
Fig 2I—SETTING THE PLANTS WITH DIBBER
I have to do afterward is to run the fingers over the
ground near the plant to fill up the hole left by the
manipulation, smoothing the surface.
My plan is to have a patch planted as quickly
as possible after the ground has been put in shape, and
it will usually pay well to get extra help to do it,
rather than string the work along by keeping only a
small force at it. If by any chance we have to quit
and let the soil become hard and packed, I always try
to refit it anew by harrowing and marking, before
going at the plant setting business once more.
If plants have to be set into hard soil, a small
dibber will be needed. This may be made of a piece
26 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
of seasoned hardwood, six inches long, one inch in
diameter at large end, and tapering to a point at the
other. The operation of setting the plants with the
dibber is made so plain by the accompanying illustra-
tion (Fig 21), that little explanation by words wiil
be needed. Open the hole with the dibber and insert
the plant an inch or so deep. Then strike the dibber
into the ground an inch or so back of the plant, and,
Fig 22—OLD KITCHEN KNIFE AS DIBBER Fig 23—DIBBER
using the lower end as a pivotal point, draw the
upper end toward you, thus pressing the soil firmly
against the underground part of the little plant. This,
of course, leaves another little opening a little back
of the plant. This may be closed, and the surface
somewhat smoothed by another light stab or so with
the dibber, or a simple manipulation of the fingers.
A broken kitchen knife ground to a point (see Fig
22), or a little flat steel dibber with handle, such as
shown in Fig 23, and as may be made by any black-
SETTING THE PLANTS 27
smith at small-cost, will always do good service. In
opening the hole have the flat side of knife or dibber
facing you. Then insert the plant back of the dibber,
withdraw the latter and strike in again back of the
} , i j
YIN
Pail
NNN
Fig 24—TRIMMING THE PLANTS
plant, pressing the soil against the roots in the same
manner as was done with the wooden dibber.
A good way of managing the whole operation is
as follows: Take up a lot of plants from the seed
bed, which may be done by running the point of a
small trowel under them, and lifting them out. Care-
fully separate and straighten them out. Next trim
28 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
off a part of the tops, if long and slender, and the
ends of the roots, as shown in Fig 24. The work of
setting out the plants is more conveniently done, and
will proceed much faster when the plants are short
and stiff than when they are left encumbered with an
excess of flimsy growth at each end. Besides, the
untrimmed plants are liable to bend or fall over, and
be in the way of the wheel-hoe and in danger of being
torn out; while the trimmed plants stand up straight
Fig 25—WRONG WAY Fig 26—RIGHT WAY
and stiff from the very start, and allow the use of
the wheel-hoe immediately after they are set out.
In short, I believe in shortening the plants at
both ends very thoroughly. It will do no harm, and
may do some good to trim the roots away to within
almost a half inch of the bulb or stem. With long
roots left on, some of the boys are bound to set the
plants in the manner shown in Fig 25, while the plants
with short roots are more likely to be properly planted
as shown in Fig 26. The new roots start out directly
from the end of the stem, and the plants with closely
trimmed roots will usually take hold of the ground
more promptly than those with all roots left on.
SETTING THE PLANTS 29
When the plants are thus prepared for setting and
bunched off, let a boy take a basketful of them and
drop them in bunches just ahead of the planters. Of
course, the work should be begun just as soon as the
ground can be got in proper shape. The soil must
be moist and crumbly, but not wet or sticky. Begin
Fig 27—PLANT SET RIGHT DEPTH
with the plants that were started first, or are largest,
and carry the job to completion as speedily as possible.
The question is often asked how deep onion plants
should be set. An onion plant will live and make a
bulb whether you set it a half inch or three inches
deep. But we want the bulb to grow pretty well out
of the ground. This seems to be the nature of the
onion plant. In order to show this in a theoretical
30 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
way I have drawn the illustrations which picture the
objects in reduced size. Fig 27 shows the plant set
one inch deep, the roots reaching further down, and
before long probably finding their way clear down to
the subsoil. The bulb will spread out to full size as
indicated by the dotted lines. This brings it just
‘
YY
Ls
ly
Fig 28—PLANT SET TOO DEEP
where we want it, namely, two-thirds or more above
the surface of the ground, where it can be easily
worked and harvested. In Fig 28 the plant is shown
as being set one and one-half inches deep. If planted
in a dry time, and in dry soil, the roots may find more
moisture and the plant revive more quickly after the
transfer, but the bulb is rather too far down in the
SETTING THE PLANTS 31
ground. Altogether I believe that one inch in depth
is just about right.
Efforts have been made by a number of persons,
to my knowledge, to construct a machine which will
set onion plants expeditiously and in a perfect manner.
Thus far I have not seen the machine that will do
better and quicker work than a nimble-fingered, active
and willing youngster or man. And yet the possibility
of finding such a machine, after a while, is by no
means excluded. We will welcome it whenever it
makes its appearance. .
CHAPTER IV
A Perseverance That Pays
TILLAGE AS MOISTURE PRESERVER AND WEED KILLER
Little needs be said to the expert gardener about
cultivation and its objects. He knows the importance
of keeping the soil well stirred among all garden crops
in general, and among onions in particular. “Tillage
is manure” is an old saying. In the present case, how-
ever, we care little about the manurial effect, for we
have provided plant food in great abundance. The
great benefit we expect from cultivation is the pres-
ervation of moisture, and incidentally, the destruction
of weeds. An inch or so of loose soil acts as a mulch,
and a most excellent one at that, which prevents the
rapid evaporation of the soil water. The moisture
rises through the compact soil, by means of capillary
action, until it reaches the stirred portion. Here its
progress is arrested, and the oniy way to reach the
surface, and escape in the air, is by evaporation, which
is greatly retarded by the loose layer of soil.
The chief tool required for the process of soil
stirring is a good hand wheel-hoe, such as the Iron
Age shown in Fig 29 or the Planet Jr, or any of a
number of others that you find on sale at seed and
supply stores. One of these tools you should and
must have. It is absolutely indispensable. I never
use the vine lifters even when using my Iron Age as
a row straddler. Sometimes I can do even more satis-
factory work with it, when I use it as a single wheel-
hoe and, reversing the hoes, go between the rows. You
TILLAGE 33
may try both ways and select the one that seems to
work best.
We begin running the wheel hoe over the onion
patch a few days after the plants are set out, and
repeat the operation just as soon as there is the least
sign of a crust over the surface. The aim is to keep
the mulch of loose soil on the ground all the time.
Running a wheel hoe in clean mellow soil is not heavy
work. The average boy will rather enjoy it. In real-
>
A f
GEE
Fr.
Fig 29—IRON AGE HAND WHEEL HOE
ity it is probably the least tiresome work in the whole
business. An acre can be gone over by one person,
even a boy, inside of one day. Fig 30 represents a
youngster pushing the wheel-hoe in the onion field.
Usually we begin operations with the double
wheel-hoe, straddling the rows. As the season ad-
vances we change to the single wheel-hoe (Fig 31),
running it between the rows.
“Ts no hand weeding to be done at all?” you may
ask me,
aiaId NOINO AHL NI NOIMLVYadO NI JOH TAAHM—OL BLT
TILLAGE 35
That depends. —If the soil is of weedy character,
or the patch is neglected for any length of time, we
may find considerable work—and disagreeable work—
Fig 3I—SINGLE WHEEL HOE
to do on hands and knees. With timely attention little
is needed, and that little can be done very effectively
by means of Lang’s hand weeder, or of a kitchen
Fig 32—LANG’s HAND WEEDER
knife, the blade of which is bent in the shape of a
curve, and sharpened on both sides. The way the
hand weeder is used is illustrated in Fig 32. There
are other styles of hand weeders in the market, and
almost any of them answer their purpose first rate.
36 THE NEW ONION CULTURE
A most excellent tool for taking out the weeds
in the rows from between the plants can be easily
made from an old worn-out hoe, leaving the lower
part (between the corners) only about two or twu
and one-half inches wide, as shown in Fig 33. With
this sharp-cornered tool you can strike between the
plants, cutting out the weeds, and loosening the soil.
This manipulation and the free use of the wheel-hoe
will usually be all the cultivation needed. But the
hand which wields the sharpened hoe should be a
careful one, and be guided by a head possessing a
fair degree of intelligence, otherwise the onion plants
may have to suffer.
Will it be feasible to substitute a mulch of fine
manure or other litter for cultivation and weeding?
I do not think so, unless it be on sandy soil and in a
very dry season. The plan works well in growing
celery. It may be tried, cautiously, for onions. In
a wet season it will increase the tendency of the plants
to make scallions. I have, however, had reports from
several intelligent growers who told me that they had
used a mulch in the onion patch with excellent results
in a dry season.
A continuous supply of moisture, furnished by
sufficient but not excessive rainfall, makes a large yield
IRRIGATION 37
reasonably certain. Whether irrigation can be made
to take the place of the natural water supply, is still
an unsolved problem, at least with us. An oversupply
at any time is liable to produce a large proportion
of scallions, and the bulbs will be of inferior quality
and prove poor keepers. Even in irrigation countries,
in no case is it advised to irrigate oftener than once
a week.
CHAPTER V,
A. Timely Pull and Haul
WHEN AND HOW TO HARVEST THE CROP
Now we come to an important point in our under-
taking. cae 19
Insects and diseases............ 87] ‘What to select......c2ccevces 13
Onion cutworms............. 92\Soils and manures............. 70
Macrosporium ............-- 101|Southern states, Onions in the..... 105
—— Pe swcevecveccess «+++ 87/Storage houses. pc kace tim ne uma aioe 42
PE Nace dcueécevcescone 100| Straw ies and onions........ 8
SMIUE sce cecceseccccccccecs 95|Tillage as moisture preserver... 32
SMTED cc csrecsccccvccssscces 89} As ‘eed BNE aos cceciank 3 $8
Vermicularia .......-.+.+.+. 102|Varieties of onions........+.+++ 75
Irrigation ...........---...02. 37| Adriatic Barletta........ au ee
Keeping onions during winter... 49} American ............ ceaueeecan
ANUTE see eeeceeececcreeeee 13, 71| American Pearl....... al vas . 81
Animal ............... +ee+e+e 17] Australian Brown.......... ee 99
Barnyard .....ssseeeeseeeeee oti Wagletia 3c sce caserek foes 81
COMNCR s h isi ccccscccccss 27) Beaulien’s Hardy White...... 85
CO SE aa a ieee ae eoseee 72) Bermu D DRRS ES” SEE ie tee 7 Sr
How to prepare it........... ESE. RUM oo oak ok oe anwa oe kec ae
Sut 3 Ont Chek soos oka... Ot" Danvers: sso ss see ces Preroee t | .
Marker, old style........5..... 22| Early Pearl......... idagecsouee
Tracing: wheel. - 34. 3.crsceee + 24) Early Yellow Cracker....... - 79
Muck land for onions.......... 4| Early ite een. i eae 82
Nitrogenous commercial fertiliz- E me ae iis anes has sxcie ae
ee Fe ee OOS sok sion vice aves page oak
Old onion culture, The......... 55 Extra E Early Red. «25 svesusees P
ion SGC Sea cd ov akoes tens ve 2 Foreign WAFS s bcc coc acedue 8r
114
PAGE
Varieties __
Giant Gibraltar.....cccssccsscseee 84
Golden Seal..ccccccccccccces z9
Italian May....scccescecsece 82
Large Mexican.....cccccreeee 83
Mammoth Pompeii.........+. 82
Mareajola “s3s.ccdeccvesadecvar O2
Multiplier ...... oweacdveee tus. ge
New: Queen. i. osacessacesoee Of
Peat on. és6s cpebeneeraesesoe
Pink Prizetaker....ccccoscecs Of
Potato Onion..
Prizewinner .........
Red Mammoth Tripoli.
Red ROC: sivcscccsssss
ROU UV ICIOSIA: oo ca 55 as cca swe
Rhode Island Yellow Cracker
CCAS sos pene dasa sbecsne case cts
Shallots ... :
Silver King.......
Silver Skin..... Se EO AO
Silver White Aetna.......... 81
Southport White Globe. @eceve 79
.
.
83
§2
INDEX
; PAGE
Varieties
Top Ce eee eeeeseoeraseeesese 76
ree Ceeeeeeseeeseseseseseeese 76
Wethersfield .....ccccssceses 98
Wethersfield Red.........+++ 79
White Garganus..........0cceeee §3
White Globe...0.ss0see1est OO
White Italian Tripoli... 83
White Portugal......... 7
ROCCa di vec ocacesece ee 8
84
ecccccccccecses JO
Seid esate 2 eke wea ae
Globe Danvers.
Prizetaker
eeeee
White Victoria. ....
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