Crop tour onions - week 36
Growers help the onions with ironing
Many plots of seed onions are difficult or irregular to harvest this year, but growers want to start harvesting in the coming weeks. To constrict the neck of the onion before harvesting, they use mechanical ironing. This results in various creative solutions.
Due to later sowing, slow growth at the beginning of the season and a number of other reasons, many plots are difficult and irregular to cultivate this season. Several growers from the Boerenbusiness Crop tour therefore switch to machine ironing. Although it is not entirely clear how effective machine ironing is compared to cutting the foliage high when harvesting, forced ironing can certainly have a positive effect. Finally, the neck of the onion is better constricted.
Tube on the front linkage
Several plots of land are already being cleared in Zeeland, but not at Klaasjan Boer in Kortgene. Last Monday he helped iron his plot of onions, as part of it was still standing. With a plastic tube in the front linkage he pressed the onion foliage. "It seems to have done its job," says Boer. Grubbing is now also planned. "Now we just have to wait and see and then I expect to harvest at the end of next week. It dries quickly under these temperatures, but the soil directly under the onions is still black. After all, the nights are a lot cooler."
wings sprayer
A little further south in Philippine (Zeeland), grower Jacky Dieleman has the same problem. Some of his onions were not ironed and the question remained if and when that would happen. That's why he gave the foliage a tap with the help of a wingssprayer last Tuesday (September 5). Dieleman sees results after one day. "I think it did something. In addition, we were ready quickly, with the width of the wingssprayer you can take a lot with you," says Dieleman. By lowering the drag cloth a little further into the foliage, you drag through the crop, as it were, and tap the necks of the onions. To compare how this machine ironing turned out, Dieleman skipped a strip. That difference is clearly visible after a day.
The first two plots were cleared this week, but the other growers of the Crop Tour indicate that their onions are also difficult to iron. In Kimswerd, Friesland, Hogenhout helped the onions by ironing the last onions that remained standing, just as he had done before in other years.
Jesse Torringa
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