Queen
A small and very early variety of the Silver-skinned section, which forms bulbs very quickly, perhaps quicker than any other. Sown early in March, it is full grown by June; and it is also highly recommended for autumn sowing. The bulbs are small, but very firm and solid, and keep well; skin thin, silvery-white. The plant has rarely more than two or three leaves. SYN. New Queen.
Silver-skin. Much like PARIS SILVER-SKIN, or EARLY WHITE NAPLES. The bulbs ripen and keep well into the winter. This variety and all in the section are most desirable, and of greatest use for pickling.
Trebons. Bulbs very large, obovate, tapering to the stalk or neck; flesh pale and rather soft, but of mild and excellent quality. A first-rate Onion, of fine appearance, resembling very closely the imported Spanish variety. It is one of the best for autumn sowing, and succeeds most favourably in warm seasons.
Two-bladed. The true two-leaved type has small roundish bulbs of a dull yellowish-brown colour; they are about 1in. in diameter, firm, ripen early, and keep well. Much grown for pickling on account of its small size. Wethersfield Red. Bulbs large, flattened, or oblate, of even and regular outline; outer skin dull red or purplish; inner flesh pure white. A handsome American variety--perhaps the best of all the red Onions--of excellent quality, and good keeping properties.
White Globe. Bulbs of medium size, globular or obovate, with a high crown. A much-esteemed, and good-keeping sort, similar in many respects to WHITE SPANISH, but of a different shape.
White Spanish. Bulbs large, flattened, base broad, and sometimes a little hollow and uneven; skin pale straw-colour, and falls off readily; flesh solid, almost white, and of first-rate quality. This is the type of Onion most largely cultivated. It generally keeps in good condition up till late in spring. Of the numerous forms, the following are recommended as being the best: ANGLO WHITE SPANISH, BANBURY, NUNEIIAM PARK, READING, and ROUSHAM PARK HERO.
Yellow Danvers. Bulbs of medium size, with small base and fine slender neck; flesh very firm throughout, of fine quality. A fine and distinct variety, which ripens off freely and keeps well.
The following are varieties of Onion that are distinct in habit from those already enumerated. They are useful to grow in small quantities, as sometimes they come in when others are not procurable.
Egyptian, Tree, or Bulb-bearing Onion (GARDEN ROCAMBOLE). This throws up a stem from the bulb, which has to be planted, and produces a number of small bulbules, about the size of marbles, on the top, that are excellent for pickling. Offset bulbs are also formed underground; and from these, and the other small ones produced on the stem, the variety is propagated. Perennial Tree or Top Onion. This is somewhat similar to the EGYPTIAN, but the bulbules are smaller, and none are produced underground. The plant is perennial, and has long, fibrous roots.
Potato or Underground Onion. A variety cultivated something like Shallots. Small bulbs are planted singly, and around them new ones are formed. They are of irregular shape, of fair quality, and useful for an early supply. This variety is not propagated from seeds.
Welsh Onion. This is a herbaceous perennial, with long, fibrous roots; it forms no bulbs. There are two varieties, the Red and the Green, cultivated for the use of their tops, or leaves. Propagated by seeds, or by division of the roots.
ONION FLY (Anthomyia Phorbia ceparum). This insect is at times most hurtful to Onions, the larvae burrowing into, and eating, the bulb scales, near the base, in companies of from two or three to one hundred, or even more. These attacks are very serious in some localities, the greater part of the crop being often severely injured. The bases of the thick leaf-scales rot, and the plants are easily pulled up, leaving the decaying bulb and the maggots in the soil. The flies are not unlike common house-flies in general appearance. They are of a blackish colour, thickly powdered with grey; the sides of the thorax are pale, and there are three dark lines on the back. In certain lights, the abdomen has a whitish lustre on it, with, in the male, a darker median stripe. The eyes are separated, in the male, by a slender, black, white-bordered line; the face has a pale lustre, and the forehead is black, as are the antennae and palpi; the legs are pitch black, the wings being pale grey, and the poisers white. The length of the insect is about 1/4in. In the female, the forehead is broad, with a reddish-brown, vertical median stripe, and the body is more ochreous in colour than in the male.
Life History. The flies emerge, in early summer, from the brown pupae, which have remained all winter underground, sometimes in the Onion, but usually near it in the soil. The female generally lays her eggs, five or six on each plant, on the leaves, just above the soil; and from these emerge larvae, which bore downwards in the soil, and into the leaf bases, causing the whole Onion ultimately to rot under their attacks. They are nearly white, with yellow stigmas, smooth and shining, tapering (but headless) in front, and blunt behind. When fullfed, they burrow into the soil, and there become changed into chestnut-brown wrinkled pupae. The fly, larva, and pupa, are shown in Fig. 742, and a diseased bulb in Fig. 743. The entire development occupies from four to six weeks, so that several broods may appear in a summer. The first sign of attack by the larvae is that the outer leaves become yellow, and fall, withered. The habitat in the bulbs protects the larvae from injury, and from direct means of destroying them, unless the Onions are destroyed.