[annied]

Hi hopefully you wont all laugh at this question which is kinda stupid but just may save me a lot of waiting around if I'm wrong  

Planted red onion sets last autumn and they have survived the birds and appear to be growing.....well the tops are. As I didn't plant them too deeply I notice that the original set has disintegrated and gone soggy. Now I'm hoping this was just the original food source to get the plant going and that the onion itself will be growing beneath. Is this correct or has the wet winter done for my onions and I'm wasting my time  
Thanks in advance

[Babstreefern]

Sounds like they've rotted away   Were they winter onions? If not, that's why they're dead

Just to be on the safe side, try and slide your finger from the top down the side of the possible onion, very gently, and see if there's any bulb there.  If no onion, then I think its safe to say, that they've gone to that place where all onions go to die

[8doubles]

Hi hopefully you wont all laugh at this question which is kinda stupid but just may save me a lot of waiting around if I'm wrong  

Planted red onion sets last autumn and they have survived the birds and appear to be growing.....well the tops are. As I didn't plant them too deeply I notice that the original set has disintegrated and gone soggy. Now I'm hoping this was just the original food source to get the plant going and that the onion itself will be growing beneath. Is this correct or has the wet winter done for my onions and I'm wasting my time  
Thanks in advance

Yes the set uses the stored energy to get the plant growing, it will then grow the full onion which provide the same thing for the flower/seed head if left long enough. If the tops are green and healthy they should be ok.

[JohnB47]

I am fairly new to onion growing myself but having had this experience for the first time last year, I can tell you that this is normal. Provided there's green growth above ground, all is well.

I had the same surprise last January (2010). I had a close look at the healthy plants and none of them appeared to have any sort of onion bulb - the original set seemed to have disintegrated and left just the outer skin. I thought someone had replaced my onions with leeks!

Anyway, I just left them and they bulbed up as normal later in the year.

So don't worry - it's OK, they just do that.

[annied]

Cheers
thanks evryone for the comforting repilies. Hopefully we will have some great onions in a few months