[wysiwyg]

Never bothered with onions in the past but this year I planted 10 shallots, so when are they ready?? they have divided lovely but on two of my new shallots I have flower heads coming? should this happen? looked through a couple of posts, but only found one that said wait for it all to die back - so flower heads ok??

Could someone please set me straight!

[Aidy]

The old saying is in on the shortest day and out on the longest day, I pulled one last night and mine will be up tomorrow.

[DD.]

Mine are nowhere near ready to lift, I'd be wasting them if I did.

Whip off the flowers & wait until the foliage starts to yellow & die down before lifting.

[Aidy]

I was chatting to one of the old boys fuuny enough the other day, he was asking why I don't grow onions, I was saying that I had found shallots less hasle with onion fly and he replied that he had noticed a massive increase in the fly over the years, last night it dawned on me why, it is only over the last few years that over wintering onions had become more popular on the site and now pretty much everyone grows them, and it is now they lift them so there must be this huge great onion smell over Blackpool dragging the fly in from all directions, my shallots were in early and are now ready to lift so all being well they won't of been hit.

[wysiwyg]

Thanks folks, some of mine look good, but still have green stems no wilting ( just slight browning on tips)  Might leave some in and just lift if I need the space for something else.  have national collection of lettuce coming on in stages at present (me and OH of a bit of a diet) saved a fortune on salads! just need the tomatoes to hurry up!

Thanks for the advice

[yummy]

I lifted ours yesterday as the foliage was going yellow and they were sitting on the surface. They are drying on a sunny shed windowsil now.

[Salmo]

Try the wriggle test. When the shallots start to die off and look ready to lift wriggle one or two. If they come away without any effort they are ready to lift

[jacnal]

This is good to know, though i only planted mine early thie year. Could they be ready? Will have a look tomorrow. First time growing them and I'm so excited!

Sitting here looking for the send/post button, lol. Things have changed since I was last here! 

[HelenK]

Following this with interest as my shallots (Red Sun) are doing very well, they're the only thing on our plot that people have really been commenting on. They've lept up, the shoots are about a foot high and you can really see where the bulbs have divided at the neck. I can't wait to harvest them as I've never grown onions or anything similar before.

[jb]

Could anyone advise if the shallots should have clear skins on harvesting. I've been fretting over my Griselle shallots which all collapsed a couple of weeks ago although the leaves are not floppy. They are the yellow-green variety in the photos below which are supposed to be an early harvest variety compared to other varieties





 However when I pulled a bunch only a couple had any signs of skin even after a couple of days hanging in the sun. This is odd as my later varieties have skins visible but are still rigid (eg springfield which is to left of riselle in first picture.
Any offers about whether I pulled too early or will skins develop

If i have pulled too early they'll just be pickled