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Onions rotting during drying

SrockjunkySrockjunky Posts: 13
in Fruit & veg
Hi.. grew my first onions and garlic this year, i pulled them up at the weekend.  To dry them I hung them through my slatted bench in my greenhouse. I went down yesterday to find the garlic drying really well, but the onions are rotting.
Is it the heat in the greenhouse that's caused this. They are rotting on the bottoms, which would have been pointing skywards, I've since laid them flat on the bench. They were very warm to the touch.
I've now thrown the rotting ones and moved the garlic and 3 remaining onions to my garage floor.

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Posts

  • SkandiSkandi Posts: 1,723
    Wow my onions are more than a month of being ready.  Are they only rotting on one side and is that side the side that would be getting direct sun? If that is so then yes you have probably cooked them. I dry mine on the garage floor.
    Rotting in storage is often due to to much rain before harvest, there's not much one can do about that trigger though.
  • SrockjunkySrockjunky Posts: 13
    Yes, going soft and rotting on the side facing the sun... pretty sure I've cooked them...  :'(
  • SrockjunkySrockjunky Posts: 13
    These are sets I put in October last year. The sets I put in February this year are nor ready yet.. I won't be drying those in the greenhouse.. 
  • ObelixxObelixx Posts: 30,090
    I haven't harvested mine yet as I want them to fatten a bit but I hang them upside down to dry on wires strung across a wooden pallet and in the shade.

    I've given up growing Red Baron after several poor harvests and keeping abilities.  I planted a small bag of white onions this year but can't remember the variety and have obtained seeds for Rouge de Niort to sow next year.  They will actually be pink and, I hope, as tasty as the pink Roscoff onions I can buy here in season.
    Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
    "The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
    Plato
  • SrockjunkySrockjunky Posts: 13
    Thanks for that.. some good tips.
  • wild edgeswild edges Posts: 10,497
    I used to get this problems with red onions. They'd never store as well as white ones and in the end I gave up growing them for storage, planted fewer sets and just used them as they grew. Mine were always dried in cooler conditions though and I'm sure it was a fungal issue causing it.
    If you can keep your head, while those around you are losing theirs, you may not have grasped the seriousness of the situation.
  • NollieNollie Posts: 7,529
    Once the foliage has died back, I stop watering and weeding the onions and garlic at least two weeks before pulling to gradually start the drying process in-situ, then leave them to continue to dry laid on their beds, in full sun, for another week. They then get plaited and hung in a cool, dark shed.

    Letting the weeds grow rampant before pulling is an old trick to deprive them of ground water and nutrients, seems to help the neck hardening process, which in turn helps prevent rotting. As does letting the foliage die back first.

    Temperatures of 30c + don’t bother them outside, so I’m also wondering if your greenhouse has high humidity as well as heat which has contributed to the rotting?
    Mountainous Northern Catalunya, Spain. Hot summers, cold winters.
  • SrockjunkySrockjunky Posts: 13
    Humidity is high in there.. I did stop watering around 3 to 4 weeks ago to let encourage them yo dry out, seemed nice and firm when dug them up. Its been 28-30degC here, so ridiculous heat in greenhouse... daft silly error in hindsight... hard lesson that one.
  • StephenSouthwestStephenSouthwest Posts: 635
    Freeze them?
  • SrockjunkySrockjunky Posts: 13
    I could slice and freeze the good bits.. do onions freeze ok
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