What to do to prevent the onion from turning yellow in the garden
Many gardeners, especially those who are just starting to produce food, ask themselves a completely logical question: what to do so that the onion does not turn yellow? How can the current situation be corrected in the shortest possible time?
Why does the onion turn yellow
Many diseases of garden crops, including onions, are subject to this ailment. Yellowing is not temporary. And if you do not pay enough attention to such symptoms, you can ruin the entire crop.
Why do onion leaves turn yellow
Onions are a non-capricious crop that tolerates temperature changes, prolonged rains and droughts. But, despite such characteristics, from time to time, gardeners notice that the feather of a young onion in the garden turns yellow. This manifests itself in different ways: it may be covered with small yellow specks, perhaps its tips simply dry up, the stem falls, etc. In such situations, initially you need to find out what is the reason why the onion turns yellow? There may be several of them:
- adverse weather conditions;
- pests;
- lack of nitrogen;
- disease.
Feather yellowing due to drought
The first reason for the yellowing of onions is the usual drought, which is typical for many regions.
The absence of precipitation and a normal irrigation system, high temperatures lead to the fact that the process of sap flow is disrupted in the onion, but, despite this, the ability to increase the mass is not lost.
Another side of this reason applies to those gardeners who, not knowing the timing of planting, planted the plant too early. Fluctuations in the temperature background (frost on the ground) can adversely affect the fragile pagon, and the gardener can observe the yellowing process of the onion.
What to do in such situations
If the reason is drought, then you need to organize a full watering of the plant. Lack of rain for a long time should not cause the entire crop to be destroyed. A well thought out watering system helps to avoid yellowing onions. They also suggest using folk remedies to restore plants. As an option - sprinkle with wood ash (soil fertilization) on the bulbs, whose leaves turn yellow: per 1 sq. m use 500 g of ash.
Another way to recover is to dilute the ash solution to spray and water the bulbs. The calculation is as follows: 500 g of ash are diluted per 10 liters of water, all this must be insisted for 3-5 days, be sure to stir the solution. The yellow tips and leaves will no longer be green even after using the fertilizer, but such a treatment helps the plant to get out of the stress state.
Pests provoking the yellowness of onions
The yellowing of an onion feather is nothing more than a reaction to the action of certain insect pests. The bulb withers very quickly, due to the attack of certain pest coma:
- tobacco thrips;
- onion moth;
- onion fly;
- stem nematode.
To save plants, you need to know what method can be used to deal with each type of pest. Today there are no universal means of combating all garden pests, each species has its own weapon of extermination.
Tobacco thrips
One of the signs of yellowing of feathers may be the parasitism of this insect. Tobacco thrips is a very dangerous pest, as it can harm not only this vegetable, but also a number of other crops. The size of tripis is very small, it is even inferior to aphids, although the principle of parasitism is similar to aphids, it draws out all the juice from the plant and, as a result, the bulb withers and rots. It can overwinter in soil, bulbs, even in those that are left for sowing, therefore, if onion sets begin to turn yellow in a well-watered and cultivated area, the reason is probably thrips.
How to deal with this pest? Professional gardeners recommend a very simple prophylaxis: before planting, the seeds must be treated with hot water. Its temperature should be 42-46 ° C, time consumption - 10-15 minutes. Initially, onion seeds are dipped in warm water, then cooled in cold water. Tripis cannot survive such procedures.
If it manifests itself already in the garden, after disembarkation, then chemical agents can be used to combat insects: they can help to get rid of the pest forever. If the onion in the garden turns yellow and the reason is tobacco tripis, the soil must be treated with such preparations as "Confidor Maxi" or "Iskar".
Onion moth
This insect manifests itself very quickly when it is sunny and hot outside. Its appearance explains why the onion turns yellow, or rather, the tips of the feather. Initially, the upper part of the plant changes color from green to yellow, then the leaves completely wither. If spots of a yellow tint appear on them already in the spring in May or at the beginning of summer in June, this indicates that the plant is slowly falling under the harmful influence of the onion moth. It looks like a common (standard) moth and parasitizes at night. But you need to fight not with butterflies, but with caterpillars, because they are the ones that cause the greatest harm to the plant.
The moth can lay eggs in the ground next to root vegetables. Soon from these eggs, small caterpillars up to 1 m long appear.These caterpillars very quickly penetrate the leaves, eat them out from the inside, which causes yellowing of the feather, after which a further stage of transformation takes place and an adult moth appears, which can winter in the garden.
How to deal with moths? Initially, you can use standard folk remedies. You need to use the following: oven ash, garlic infusion or tobacco, all of this negatively affects the moth. But if this option does not help, then the plant must be treated with Iskra, Metaphos. The main condition is that before spraying the garden, it is imperative to make sure that there will be no rain in the near future, because if the product washes away, the actions taken can be considered in vain.
Onion fly
These insects are regarded as the most dangerous. These are larvae that feed on all varieties of onions, including the most popular and adored family variety. The appearance of a fly will explain why young onions turn yellow in the garden. If the gardener notices that the onion feathers have turned yellow and dried up, it is necessary to take action as soon as possible, because it is not a single root crop that is threatened, but the whole crop.
If the tips of the onion turn yellow and the reason is in the onion fly, then processing is carried out with specialized chemicals. You can also do prevention, for this you can plant parsley, dill or carrots next to the onion bed. The fly simply cannot stand this aroma, therefore either disappears or lays eggs in a different place.
Another option for dealing with onion flies is to feed and fertilize the soil with saline or ammonia.It is enough to dilute 200 g of salt in 10 liters of water and, in addition, ammonia (you need a small amount). It is possible to spray the garden with this solution only in the most desperate situations, because it has a very detrimental effect on the soil. As a preventive measure, you can spray the feathers of bulbous root crops.
Stem nematode
The onions in the garden turn yellow and the rest of the plants feel normal? The reason for this is the emergence of a pest: the garden is filled with the "stem nematode" worm. The size of this worm is very small, but there is a lot of harm from it. Due to the stem nematode, the process of rotting green onions begins to occur, and the leaves turn yellow and sores appear on them. The main problem is that this parasite strongly affects the turnip in the garden, and it can live in any soil for many years.
In order to fight the pest, there are good folk remedies. One of the preventive options is salty water or just hot. Before disembarking, pagons need to be processed in one of the waters, if it is salty, then for 20 minutes, if hot - for 10 minutes. If the already planted root crop dries up, then you can treat it with Bracht's tincture: you need to thoroughly water the root of the plant, after which the stem nematode dies and the yellowing stops, the plant is restored.
Lack of nitrogen
In this case, one quite natural question arises: how to feed the onion plant, because it is very simple to diagnose this condition. Not only the onion, but also all other crops that are located near the onion, fall within the radius of damage. In a short time, the tips of the leaf turn yellow and dry in them, they acquire a faded color, the fruits change shape and seem to shrink.
Even in this case, you can observe the bending of the edges of the leaves, spots similar to lichens appear on them. Often this is caused by a long rainy season or by the fact that the garden is very much watered. Then useful substances are simply washed out from the upper sphere of the earth into the depths, where they become inaccessible to the roots. For a good harvest, the plants need to be fed. If the onion feather turns yellow in places, darkening and pronounced lethargy of arrows appear on it, it's time to start preparing fertilizer.
When the onion turns yellow and the reason for this is a lack of nitrogen, fertilization is necessary to cure the onion plant. Careful and proper care will help to quickly restore normal condition. Professionals warn that non-compliance with the dosage and excessive nitrate nutrition triggers active vegetative processes. That is, the gardener will observe a rapid increase in green mass, which develops to the detriment of the root crop. This is bad initially when onions or family onions are planted, because planting such varieties provides for a good rich harvest.
How to make a solution
The solution consists of the following ingredients:
- Food waste (they must be of plant origin: cleaning from vegetables, thick from coffee or tea, etc.).
- Green herb, thanks to which you can get additional vitamins.
- Weeds, if not, seeds will do.
- Straw, hay.
Water is poured into a large container, ideally it will be rainwater, and everything that was collected is added:
- hay;
- grass;
- cleaning vegetables;
- crystallized honey;
- expired condensed milk;
- sour wine;
- a few tablespoons of sugar.
This mixture must be thoroughly stirred, then left until the moment when active fermentation begins, which will be evidenced by a strong aroma. If it is hot outside, then the solution will need several days (up to 5) for the finished state, if the weather is cool, it will take 1.5-2 weeks. Next, 1 liter of nitrogen fertilizer is taken, diluted in 10 liters of water, and the onion plant is watered with it.
Fertilizing the root crop in the garden is best when it is raining or when the ground is still wet.If it is hot outside and no rain is expected, then the garden must first be watered. In addition, urea, which many know as urea, is used as mineral fertilizers. It must be used with extreme caution as it promotes the growth of fungi.
The tool provides high-quality care, because if the bulb, due to certain conditions, does not receive any useful components, you can see yellowing of the leaves, spots, etc.
Diseases of the onion plant
If the onion turns yellow, it is quite possible that the development of some kind of disease manifests itself in this way, and there are a lot inherent in this plant culture. The most common diseases are bacterial rot, rust, etc.
These diseases are caused by bacteria and fungi, which can spread through poor-quality planting material, so the first thing to do is to prevent pests from breeding, it will be enough to carry out simple preventive actions. The sevok must be sorted out and the spoiled bulbs must be eliminated from the total mass.
There is a nuance regarding decorative onions: during the cultivation of this variety, so that it does not turn yellow or be stained, all the specified processing methods must be used.
Onions that turn yellow in the sun can be considered healthy as well, but only when they are harvested and dried for storage. In all other cases, if observed:
- instead of green, a yellow feather;
- leaves fall to the ground;
- the tips of the feathers turn yellow -
an onion plant needs careful care. In order not to establish the reason why the yellowing began, the problem must be nipped in the bud. For this, proper care of the site and the plant is sufficient. Do not forget that it needs to be fed on time for better growth.
Conclusion
It is important to remember that the reason why the onion turns yellow is the main factor in choosing additional products that will help make the onion feather healthy and the harvest rich. Ash is poured on the garden bed, thereby fertilizing it, as a result of which the plant begins to receive adequate nutrition.
Why is the harvest not growing, why the onions have begun to turn yellow, why the plantings do not meet expectations - the answer to all questions is the same: they are struck by some kind of disease, and they have only one hope: careful care, timely watering with medicines from the farmer's stolons.