Monday 9 May 2016

Green Mountain Potato Onion

I quite like the idea of potato onions, as I understand them.

There are crops which are grown by giving people vegetables to replant, like potatoes for instance, where rather than getting seed to grow, you get given pre-grown tubers to plant, which sprout and grow more tubers.

One of these crops, is the potato onion.  From what I understand it was rare for them to go to seed, and seed just wasn't available.  Then they went to seed for one guy somewhere in the states, and he saved the seed, and gave some away or sold it.

Normally, when you plant a onion seed, it grows one onion.  So you need to plant at least as many seeds as you want to have onions to harvest.  The potato onion however, once it has grown, is supposed to split into multiple bulbs per plant.

I got sent some potato onion seed, which was imported from the USA via Australia.  I've grown out around 22 seedlings, which can be seen below.  This was a germination test, but I planted them out for the same of it and it can't hurt to see if they survive the upcoming Winter.  The green allium in the foreground is garlic chives.

Potato onion, Green Mountain - 2016-05-04 - 01

I plan to plant out a lot more in the Spring, with the intent of getting some to go to seed, so I can expand the amount of seed I have.

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