No time to post lately as work and non-gardening life have gotten in the way this past week, but I did receive a lovely gift today:
Gail took a day trip to Maine today to visit some family. While there she stopped by Beach Plum Farm in Ogunquit, ME and visited the community gardens on the grounds. She ended up chatting with 2 gardeners who gave her a few bunches of Egyptian Onions, the biggest one is in the above photo.
Egyptian Onions, known as Walking Onions or Tree Onions are perennial onions which are hardy to zone 3. When a bulb is planted and grows new bulbs form on the step of the plant. Eventually the cluster of bulbs (pictured above) gets so top heavy that it bends the plant and touches the ground, taking root and growing into a new set of onions.
As they are left to grow they will spread or walk across your garden. You can pull each set of clusters off and divide the bulbs in order to plant them. The stalks of the plants can also be cut before the onion clusters form and used similar to chives.
Planting a cluster or 2 should yield enough for stalks, bulbs and to save some for planting next year. Like traditional onions bulbs also will form below the ground. If planted in the fall they can be dug up as spring onions.
I'll be prepping and planting fall seeds this weekend and will most certainly be planting some Egyptian/Walking Onions, so stay tuned for future Walking Onion updates!
Below is the full hall of the 3ish clusters of Walking Onions I was gifted:
(Walking Onions: Some for Eating, Some for Planting, Some for...?)
1 comment:
That is so cool! I never heard of this kind of onion before. I love that it "travels"
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