OK, let’s talk about onions and when it’s the “right time” to harvest them!
When you grow onions, you’ll likely notice that at some point later in the season, the greens will sort of lean over and rest on the ground. A lot of guides out there will simply tell you that this is the sign of maturity you’re looking for. We disagree.
Some years, we’ve found that this can happen far too early in the season. We’ve also found that we can induce it simply by weeding our onions, typically when we accidentally knock over one or more of the stems. Additionally, whether you do or don’t cut the stems off early in the season can influence this timing as well. So, we think there’s a little bit more subtlety to onion maturity than just the vertical or horizontal state of the greenery.
A better sign to look for is looking for the greenery leaving the stem, typically right where the onion’s greens are bent later in the season. If the bent area is looking white, grey or light brown, that’s a positive sign that your onion is done with its growth and will not continue to pack on more weight. However, if it’s still quite green, this indicates the presence of chlorophyll and that the onion is still growing.
Now, finding an optimal harvest time across “all” of your onions might be a tad difficult. What we generally look for is that the majority (or even just “a lot”) of our onions have reached full maturity. We generally prefer to harvest all of our onions in one fell swoop, as opposed to waiting for specific maturity levels. In addition, you might have to wait for an optimal time to harvest, depending on the season.
Optimal harvesting of onions is better done when the soil is decently dry. If you harvest when the soil is wet or damp, you can lose the outer layer of the onion, which helps protect it for long term storage. We often have to deal with this as our typical “ideal” harvest time is also frequently a wet time of year. Basically, we think it’s more important to wait for better harvest conditions than “perfect” maturity levels with your onions. Even a so-called “immature” onion will be fine to eat and will put up with long term storage.
Onions are quite field hardy, especially in the subarctic. You’ve got “wiggle room” measured in weeks since it’s very unlikely that our onions will begin flowering. The biggest key is to get them out before the hard frosts start rolling in, but if you need to, you can certainly ride them into the first few frosts. So, for us, that usually means anytime between a week or two before first frost and a week or two after first frost.
This year, we’re looking at a potential three day break in our “rainy and dreary” weather next week. So, what we’re thinking is that the tail end of that break might be best for our onion harvest right now. We’ll definitely talk about our harvest in more depth as there’s some things we’ve got to do to get them prepped for long term storage!
