 Hi there and welcome to the channel. So it is a very exciting day for me here on the Saskatchewan Prairies Canada because today is the first day that I am going to be starting some seeds for my outdoor 2023 garden. And today I'm going to be starting onions from seed and I'm going to be using two different methods. So I'm going to be using the traditional method of indoor starts that you start in these little seedling containers, put them under lights and grow them indoors till they can go outside. The second method I'm going to be using today is the winter sowing method. So I'm going to walk you through how to set up these onion seeds and the two different methods and while we do that we'll talk about the pros and cons of each. So onions are a cool season crop that requires 90 days or more to get to that maturity stage. So because of that you need to start them indoors early and get that growth started before planting them outdoors. And onions are also very slow growing so you need to start them about 10 to 12 weeks before you're going to be moving them outdoors. Here in Saskatchewan Canada I'm in growing zone three. Our last frost date is about the third week of May. So I want to have my onions ready to go outdoors about the end of April. So look at your growing zone, check when your last frost date is and plan to start your onion seeds about 10 to 12 weeks before they're ready to go outside. So for a lot of you in the higher growing zones you've probably already started your onions. Here in zone three it's there's lots of time yet over the next few weeks to get them going. So picking the right type of seed for your area is key to having a really good crop. So there are three types known as short day onions, long day onions and intermediate day onions. So here where I live in Canada we have very long days of sunlight in the spring and summer somewhere between 14 to 16 hours of daylight. So I want to use long day onions and those onions will grow the best here because they require more days of sunlight. Further south you go in the northern hemisphere here down in the south where you have shorter days maybe 10 to 12 hours days of sunlight then you want to look for that short day onion variety. So because we want to take advantage of those long days to have the best onions and the biggest bulbs we want them to be outdoors you know early spring when those days are very long all the way into June when the days start to get a little bit shorter. So as I mentioned the two methods we're going to do is planting seeds indoors under lights and also doing the winter sowing method. So as far as starting your seedlings indoor you're going to need some grow lights or a very sunny window to start your onion seedlings. They also require you know day to day care you're going to have to keep them watered once they start getting into that true leaf stage then you are going to want to give them some water soluble fertilizer and you know they just need a little more care and maintenance than the other method of winter sowing. Of course with winter sowing you don't need all that equipment you don't need grow lights you don't need space in your house you don't have to worry about finding a sunny window. Basically you are setting up seeds in a little mini greenhouse made from a milk jug or other plastic containers. You plant your seeds you put them out in the snow bank and you forget about them till spring. So let's talk about the soil mixture that you should use for each of these methods. So for indoor starts I use it just a basic seed starting mix that I make myself and I just posted a video on how to make that DIY potting mix for seed starting and how to sterilize it. So I will leave a link up at the top of the screen and also in the description if you want to check out that video. So here's the mixture that I have made it is just a mixture of peat moss some perellite and vermiculite and I moistened it with some boiling water just to make sure I kill off any of those fungus gnats or fungus gnats eggs that could be in that soil that you bring into your home because these are going to be living in my house under the lights I really don't want to have to deal with fungus gnats. So start off by just filling your trays and the great thing about onions is you can use pretty much any kind of container. I'm going to be just generously sprinkling the seeds into these and you know they can live together in tight quarters for a long period of time you don't have to worry about you know having them in individual cells. So I have picked out five of these that I've just recycled from last year and we're just going to get them filled up with soil and you want to make sure that you have a bottom tray of some kind under here because it is always best to bottom water your indoor seedlings fungus gnats like to lay their eggs on moist soil so if you water from the bottom it kind of helps with that it also helps with that damping off problem that you can have with too much moisture on the top of your soil which causes you know mold or things to grow that will attack your little seedlings. So you want to just lightly press it in fill these up as much as you can so once you got your containers filled and lightly packed I'm going to just give them another spraying of water here just to make sure that soil is good and moist just let that settle in. So the potting mix that you're going to use in your winter sowing jugs is a little bit different than what you traditionally would use for your indoor seed starts because your plants are going to be kind of living in this little mini greenhouse right up until the time they go out into the garden they need a little bit more nutrients in their soil to kind of help them thrive and grow. So what I'm going to be doing here is just again making up my own DIY potting mix you can you know buy a good quality potting mix to use for your winter sowing that works as well. So I'm taking a few scoops of my peat moss and perlite so I'm starting off by just adding a little sprinkling of this all-purpose organic fertilizer and then I'm also going to add a couple scoops of this mushroom compost that I purchased from a local garden center. If you have your own compost you could add it you could also add in worm castings if you've made your own or if you purchased your own just a little bit of something to give those seedlings a really good start. So that is how you get your potting soil ready for starting up your onions and so now we will get planting some seeds. So I have five containers here ready to get my onion seeds going and the first one I'm going to use is a early yellow globe onion I purchased these a couple years ago so again I'm not too sure how how good the seeds are so I'm going to start off with them. Just going to lightly sprinkle them around spread them out as good as you can. Like I said onions don't mind being crowded in their containers so of course you want to mark your containers before you forget what you've planted in each I do this all the time especially when I'm videoing and not really thinking about what I'm doing but I don't have my markers ready so I'm just going to put my package here so I don't forget what I planted. The walla wallas these are ones I'm really hoping to get some really nice sized bulbs this year. They're kind of a black seed so they're once they hit the dirt it's a little hard to see but again I just try to sprinkle them evenly over the top of the soil. So one of the benefits of growing your onions indoors is that usually you know once they start to get you know four inches or higher you you give them a trimming and then you can use those trimmings those greens in your cooking so you kind of get to start enjoying the onions earlier than you would if you have them in the winter sowing method. And like I said I have never grown leeks before but I see lots of people do and I see lots of great recipes with leeks so we are going to try these. Seeds of a leek look very similar to all the other onions. And I got some fresh walla walla onion seeds this year this pack that I got from west coast seeds is from last year so I'm just not sure you know if those seeds are going to germinate. For a little extra insurance I'm going to do another container of these newer walla walla seeds. So once you got your seeds all planted you basically just need to put another light layer of seed starting mix on the top they don't need to be planted too deep. I've got the sun shining in here this morning so I don't know hopefully it's not rocking my video here too much but it is sure nice to have some sunshine. So one of the good things about the cold weather I guess is that we usually end up with really nice blue sunny skies so if you're working indoors like this it is quite nice to have that sunshine. You can hear my puppy in the background we have a new puppy named Pepper she hopefully will be a good gardener with me this spring and hopefully she won't get up my winter sowing jugs. Okay so now we're ready to set up some seeds using the winter sowing method and if this is your first time hearing about winter sowing what it is basically is set up your seeds in containers such as these milk jugs so what you'll be doing is filling these full of soil putting in a generous layer of seeds sealing this up and putting it outside in the subzero temperatures so what happens is these seeds are basically going to be frozen and it kind of mimics what would happen to a seed naturally if it was in the ground over winter. So the benefit of the winter sowing method is once you've got these set up and set out into the snow banks you're pretty much all you have to do they just sit in there until spring comes and when the conditions are right those seeds will know it's time to start generating they will have some of the nutrition of the potting soil to really get them going this will protect them from you know the cold nights and as it gets warmer you can open these up and once the plants are getting closer to being ready to be planted out in your garden they can be hardened off very easily. So it's a very hands-off method that works really well with most seeds. I've made a lot of videos over the last few years so I will link the playlist on the screen and down in the description below you can watch some more in-depth tutorial videos on winter sowing. So like I say you usually take a milk jug like this and cut it so that you have kind of a hinge here you always make sure you have some holes in the bottom for good drainage and then you can just start filling it up with potting soil. Hopefully I've made just enough for two. So you want to get about three or four inches of potting soil in here so they have a good root system to grow in. So I guess one of the downfalls of winter sowing is you know the germination success might be a little bit less than starting indoors but again it's a very cheap method that you know you don't need to have the lights you don't have to constantly water and fertilize and and baby your seedlings they're basically going to be on their own and they should be a good tough seedling by the spring and I've had really good success with onions they are you know a cool tolerant plant so this method works really well. You want to make sure that your winter sowing jugs have a lot of moisture in them and one thing I like to do while I'm planting them up is do some bottom watering right off the bat fill this tray full of water and just let it wick it up from the bottom we'll also be top watering it once we get the seeds in. So just to try to make sure you know you have the best possibility of success like I mentioned earlier you want to use fresh onion seeds for this kind of method just to make sure that you know you have the best chance of getting good germination I'm going to use a good generous amount of these seeds which I usually do for winter sowing sprinkle them all over and then the other one is going to be the ruby ring because these are going to be out in the cold I'm going to put a little bit thicker layer of potting soil on top of these seeds again just give it a generous watering here you want to make sure that soil is really thoroughly saturated before you put it out in the cold that way they have a good moist soil mixture for spring so then we'll just get these marked and sealed up and ready to go outside so I just wrote out the name of the onions that I planted I'm going to stick them inside and then we're ready to seal these shut with some duct tape so I just start off by ripping a long piece that should sit around the entire jug start at one end here just gently hold it in place wrap it around and then just go around and seal it up here and once that's done your little mini greenhouse is ready to go outside first of all though I'm going to write the name of what's on here in here and I usually put the date that I have planted these seeds as well so you make sure it's nice and heavy meaning that you know it's well saturated with some water and it's ready to go out into the cold so when it comes to setting your winter sowing jugs outside you want to be sure that you are placing them somewhere so that come spring those jugs are going to get the maximum amount of sunlight and benefit from that heat and hopefully get a good jump start on germination so in the past I've put my winter sowing jugs right into my garden here around my containers it's out of the wind and it gets lots of sunshine but this year we've got a pile of snow and that option is just not going to work for me this year and if you live in a zone like I do where you get a lot of pretty hectic winds in the spring time you want to make sure your jugs are protected from the wind you also want to make sure your jugs benefit from precipitation like rain and snow that comes in the spring so putting them under a table or under the eaves of a building is not ideal and if you have a dog or a puppy like we do you want to consider where you place your jugs to keep them safe from pets last year this old wagon made a perfect spot for my winter sowing jugs they were up off the ground protected from the dog they got lots of sunshine they didn't blow away in the wind but this year I because we have so much snow I can't even get to them so I have to come up with an alternate so for now a wagon like this will work just to keep them frozen and safe from the wind and from our puppy so I hope you enjoyed watching how I use two different methods to start my onions for my 2023 outdoor garden if you enjoyed this video please hit that like button leave a comment and don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss out on future videos coming to the channel thanks for watching