Alright!
This is John Kohler with growingyourgreens.com.
Today we have another exciting episode for you in the backyard garden and today I’m
planting something.
Planting something cool actually and it’s not normally done but I figured I’d do it
because to me gardening, as is life, is an experiment and it’s a fun experience.
And so I always wanna encourage you guys to experiment to see what happens and more importantly
never waste any food alright.
Let me go ahead and explain to you guys what I have.
So these are some of the onions actually I grew last year.
My last years harvest.
They’ve been sitting out for months and months and months and months and months now
and actually some of them are still good I could probably still eat them but many of
them as you guys could see are actually sprouting.
So this is a sprouted onion so what do u do with a sprouted onion?
No you can’t eat it right you gotta chuck it you gotta throw it away.
No don’t throw it away.
Umm you could compost it which would be better but even better than that I would encourage
you guys to replant them.
Why do onions sprout?
Have you ever contemplated that?
Why do onions sprout?
I mean you guys buy onions from the store and they sprout just like this right.
What do u do with them?
This product is bad.
No the plant is trying to reproduce.
That’s like the number 1 goal of every living creature in the whole plant including us.
I like attempting to reproduce but the onions actually do like to reproduce and if it sits
around long enough it’s actually gonna start to grow roots.
I don’t know if you could see the little root here and down here.
These are the root hairs.
It’s trying to hit the soil and it’s not cause it’s just been in a box.
So as you guys could see a lot of these guys are starting to sprout up.
Some more than others.
And I’m gonna go ahead and plant these guys just to see what happens.
You know they’re probably gonna make more bulbs for me to eat.
Onions are not normally grown like this.
They’re normally grown a few ways.
Number 1 you got the onion seeds.
So this is one that actually I wanted to seed.
I got onion seeds that I could plant and then the seeds need to sprout so they need to germinate
then they need to take a long time to grow into little plants.
Which I don’t necessarily recommend growing onion plant seeds unless you have a nice long
season or are a good planter.
I’m not a good planter.
I don’t plant in advance that much.
So another way to plant your onions are by planting little bulbs.
So like my onions are so small.
They’re like planting little bulbs because they’re basically gonna grow and expand
into whole plants.
The final way I like to normally plant my onions is by onion sets.
So I get basically little starter plants.
They come in like dirt clod and they’re little plants and you just basically pluck
them in and grow them and that I find the easiest and best way to grow onions normally.
I have used the other ways but that by far is my favorite and this is another way to
try to plant my sprouter ones already.
You know I know already what’s gonna happen to some extent because I got some that were
sprouting earlier in the season.
I planted them out behind me in this bed and as you guys could see I have all these onion
plants growing and you know the onions developing underneath the soil.
So I’m gonna go ahead and plant the rest of these guys out and dedicate one whole bed
to it.
Now, if you have unlimited space to garden yes go ahead and plant your sprouting onions.
If you have one raised bed to grow you know I don’t know if I’d waste time on sprouting
onions.
I have extra bed that are basically empty right now so I’m like oh yeah let’s just
go ahead and plant these guys see what happens and it’s a fun experiment.
If nothing else I could chop and eat the onion greens, the tops you know, the greens of these
guys and I’m confident that they’re gonna produce some onions onions underneath the
ground for me to eat later on in the season.
As you guys could see I don’t eat a lot of onions so they end up sprouting.
But let’s go ahead and get it planted out and show you guys the technique I’m gonna
use that amazingly makes planting quick easy and simple so that you guys can plant your
sprouter onions in the garden.
Get more onions.
So how I like to plant my onions is with a bulb planter.
Actually I like to plant a lot of things with the bulb planter including you know like 6
pack plants and all this kind of stuff.
It allows you to really just go in there and basically take out a section.
Whoops.
Crap of dirt I’ll throw it in a bucket.
A little hole ready to plant out.
Alright so I guess the next thing we’re just gonna go ahead and uh plug out all the
different areas where I’m gonna plant and then I’ll be able and ready to drop in my
onions that are sprouting and bury them over and get these guys out into this raised bed.
So as you guys could see we got almost all my holes done.
Just one more dig right there in the middle.
And this goes very quickly using one of these guys.
Alright next thing just gonna go ahead and drop these babies in, cover them up, and we’re
gonna call it a day.
Alright finally got this bed almost all planted out.
I saved one last guy for you guys to show you guys an important concept you know.
It’s very important when you’re planting onions like if you’re planting the sets
or the little maybe plants, you don’t wanna bury them like too deep you know don't put
them like 5 inches under the ground right.
You want this top part where it’s the living growth barely popping out and this way your
onions that you’re growing are gonna grow a lot larger.
Now the other thing I wanna mention is that if you guys have onions sprouting like this
you can also plant them in a pod thing and keep it in your kitchen you know a nice heated
area where it gets a lot of light and then you could just simply harvest the greens to
keep these guys growing.
Then maybe one day you could transplant them outside if you’d like.
Alright so let me go ahead and do a close up so you guys know how to plant specifically
this onion so we don’t plant it too deep.
Alright so here we go.
Here’s the sprouted onion.
We’re just gonna go ahead and stick that guy in there wow.
Alright, that might be a little bit too tall.
I want to try to bury it underneath the ground a little bit more just so that the top barely
sticks out there.
I think that’s probably gonna be pretty good.
I got some extra soil here and just cover it up just like that.
That’s just about a perfect job so that it’s not too far down and now this top growth
is gonna get sun, it’s gonna photosynthesize and it’s gonna burst full of life.
So the final thing I’d like to say is that if you guys have sprouted onions plant them
out.
You know plant them in a raised bed like I did today, plant them in a pot, but keep them
growing.
You could harvest all the top you know baby onion greens off it for your recipes to provide
you and your family with more food.
Once I again I wanna encourage you guys out there to start growing your own food whether
that’s sprouting onions, sprouted garlic, you know whatever herbs you could grow indoors
or better yet start an outside garden.
So literally one food by one food you can stop buying foods at the grocery store and
depend on your own two hands to grow your own food.
With just two beds of these onions here I’ll have enough onions for the whole year as well
as enough onion greens so that’s one food I will not have to buy anymore at the store.
You know at present time I have tons of different leafy greens, I’ll never have to buy leafy
greens in the store and of course during tomato and pepper and eggplant season cucumbers,
I have plenty of those also.
You know so that way you can make steps towards being more sustainable and towards being healthier
so you could have a life you wanna lead.
Once again my name is John Kohler with growingyourgreens.com.
We’ll see you next time and until then remember keep on growing.