Kitchen Garden Forum

I'm planing to put in some onion sets in the next month or so. However, I read that they don't like freshly manured ground.
I've spread a relatively thin layer of manure across my new plot in early Nov. When I say thin - you scan still see soil.
My question is - should I remove the manure from the area that I plan to plant my onion sets or should I just plant them anyway?

I stand to be corrected but I believe the problem with using manure with onions is that it tends to promote excessive top growth, possible bolting and early splitting.

Personally I only put onions where the ground has been manured for a previous crop.

I would remove as much as possible and deeply dig the rest in so that it about a spit depth down

I was thinking that if I remove what I can now from the area, and in the mean time, start my onions off in pots. By the time they are ready to plant out (about 2 months from now) I guess the elements might have helped to remove some of the muck from the soil as well.

Does that sound like a reasonable plan?

As a result of your thread and suggestions I'm now wondering if I found the reason for rot amongst my onions and garlic. In both cases I loose some before they are lifted, then I loose some during the drying and storing period.

The rot I refer to isn't the classic white rot that I did have problems with in one effected bed, this is a similar rot to that you might get with poorly stored onion and garlic though my onions are hung with plenty of ventilation and the garlic stored in a plastic basket type of container I regularly have to cut and pick rotted and smelly onions and garlic.

What a stink, rotting onions.

Are you saying you always manure in the area where you grow Onions?

My gardening experience is in it's third year at the the end of 2014 and I started with soil that needed a lot of attention so I've been hammering it with cow poo and home made compost each season.

I have had some very good crops but I also had problems, carrots didn't like it and although I had good crops of onion and garlic I did have white rot in one bed then just rotted onions/garlic as I lifted them and rot setting in during the storage period.

Adding lots of manure and compost has made the soil very nice to work with and mostly stuff grows well though it seems I may have to back off with annual composting now to see if I can grow better onion and garlic.

Mostly my composting is dug in during early winter with the exception of mulching around kale, comfrew and rhubarb. These seem to thrive on neat compost, also, because I have a small comfrew farm of twenty plants in their own raised bed I always have masses of comfrey liquer or dried comfrey for mulching.

At the risk of exadgerating it's become an obsession and I have been warned by one or two members about over-feeding though the onion garlic problem and masses of worms have been the only symptoms of my obsession.