We’ve always had trouble growing red onions. We had always grown our onions from sets and red sets had never performed as well as the brown ones. They’d be grown alongside one another and given the same treatment so we could never decide exactly what we were doing wrong. When we harvested our usual poor crop of red onions in 2020 we decided we’d had enough of trying to grow reds and we’d stick to the brown varieties in 2021.

Then Mal another blogger suggested we might have better luck growing red onions from seed rather than from sets. We’re always up for a gardening challenge so last year we decided on growing some Red Baron onions from seed. Last year our seeds were sown at the beginning of March.

The onions germinated well and were left in the greenhouse to grow into decent sized plants before they were planted out at the allotment in the middle of May.

Then of course things didn’t go exactly as planned. Last summer was very dry and most things suffered due to lack of moisture our onions were no different from anything else. However, we managed a reasonable crop as the photo at the top of this post shows so we decided to try some Red Baron from seed again this year.

I’ve decided to make two seed sowings. The first batch was sown at the weekend and has been placed under our growlight inside to germinate.

Hopefully, I’ll be able to keep these seedlings growing inside until some warmer weather arrives when I’ll move them into the greenhouse for a spell before they go out into the cold frame to harden off before planting them out at the allotment.

I’ve enough seeds left to make another sowing around the beginning of March like I did last year.