Heirloom · Open-Pollinated · 100–120 days from transplant
short-day · best for southern gardens
Grows well in
Raised Bed ✓
In-Ground ✓
Container/Pot ✓
Grow Bag ✓
Meet This Plant
Texas Early Grano is the onion for the southern grow friend. It's a short-day onion, which means it bulbs when day length reaches about 10–12 hours. That's a latitude thing, not a zone thing. This variety is built for mild winters and southern growing conditions, and it thrives in that fall-to-spring growing window. If you want a sweet onion that performs better up north, Yellow Sweet Spanish is the one.
What it tastes like: Sweet and mild enough to eat raw straight off the cutting board. White flesh, thin skin, and almost none of the sharpness you'd expect from a grocery store onion. This is the onion people mean when they say they could eat it like an apple.
Growing in a cool climate? Try Yellow Sweet Spanish →
How to Grow It
Sun
Full sun. Onions need as much light as you can give them. At least 6–8 hours of direct sun daily.
Water
About an inch of water per week. Consistent moisture is especially important during bulb formation. Reduce watering as the tops start to fall over.
Sowing Details
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Depth¼ inch
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Spacing4–6 inches for full-size bulbs
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Row Spacing12–18 inches
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ThinningThinnings can be harvested and used as green onions.
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Germination7–14 days. Buy fresh seed every season. Onion seed loses viability fast.
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Days to Maturity100–120 days from transplant
When to Plant
This is a fall-planted crop. Start seeds indoors in late summer, typically August through September, and transplant out in October or November once temperatures have cooled.
The goal is to get as much leafy growth as possible through the mild winter months before increasing day length in late winter and early spring triggers bulbing. Harvest in spring when the tops fall over.
Texas Early Grano is a short-day onion. Big onions start with big plants. In northern gardens, this variety begins forming an onion before it has enough time to grow into a large plant. That’s why the onions stay smaller. Try Yellow Sweet Spanish instead.
Grow Friend Tips
This is a fall-to-spring crop, not a spring-to-summer one
If you're used to planting things in spring, Texas Early Grano will flip your thinking. Plant in fall, grow through winter, harvest in spring. The mild winter months are when this onion does its best growing. Getting the timing right is the most important thing you can do for a good harvest.
Bigger transplants mean bigger bulbs
Start seeds early enough to get stocky, pencil-thick transplants before they go in the ground. Fertilize regularly while they're growing indoors. The more leaf growth the plant has before bulbing starts, the bigger the final onion will be.
Buy fresh seed every season
Onion seed doesn't keep well. It's better to buy a fresh packet every season or you're gambling on germination.
Keep them weed free
Onions have shallow roots and don't compete well with weeds at all. A weedy onion patch means smaller bulbs. Keep the area clean from the moment you transplant and stay on top of it through winter and spring. Mulching between rows helps a lot.
Stop watering when the tops start to fall
Once about half the tops have fallen naturally, stop watering and let the bulbs finish up in the ground on their own.
Cure them before you store them
After pulling, lay the onions out in a single layer somewhere warm, shaded, and well-ventilated for a few days to a week. Texas Early Grano has thin skin and doesn't store as long as thicker-skinned varieties. Plan to use them up within 1–2 months and eat them fresh while they're at their best.
Companion plants Carrots Lettuce Beets Chamomile Tomatoes Peppers
Harvest & What to Do With It
When it's ready
Texas Early Grano is ready when the tops turn yellow and fall over naturally, typically 100–120 days from transplant. Once about half the tops have fallen naturally the onions are almost ready. Give it about a week then pull and cure them. The bulbs should be 3–4 inches in diameter at peak harvest.
How to harvest
Loosen the soil around the bulbs with a garden fork first, then pull by the tops. Handle them carefully because any bruising leads to rot in storage. Pull on a dry day if possible. Wet onions don't cure well.
Yield
One plant produces one bulb. A full packet at good spacing gives you a generous harvest of large sweet onions ready in spring.
Curing
Lay pulled onions out in a single layer somewhere warm, shaded, and well-ventilated. Cure for a few days to a week until the necks and outer skins are dry. Texas Early Grano has thin skin so it doesn't need as long to cure as thicker-skinned varieties. Clip the tops to about an inch above the bulb once fully cured.
Short-term storage
Keep cured onions in a cool, dry, dark spot with good air circulation. Texas Early Grano keeps 1–2 months at best. It's a fresh eating onion first and a storage onion second. Use it up quickly and enjoy it at its sweetest.
Long-term storage
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Freezing: Chop or slice, freeze flat on a tray, then bag. No blanching needed. Keeps up to 12 months. Texture softens so use in cooked dishes only.
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Dehydrating: Slice thin and dehydrate at 145°F until completely crisp. Makes excellent onion flakes or powder. Keeps 12 months airtight.
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Refrigerator pickling: Slice thin, pack into a jar with vinegar, salt, and sugar, and refrigerate. Ready in a few hours and keeps for several weeks.
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Pressure canning: Onions can be pressure canned safely but they turn soft and lose most of their flavor. Not worth it on their own.
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Water bath canning: Not safe for plain onions due to low acidity. Pickled onions in an acidified brine are fine.
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Root cellaring: Cured onions store well at room temperature in a cool dry place. Moisture is the enemy so avoid damp cellars.
What to cook
Raw on everything where the sweetness is the point. Sliced thin on burgers, tacos, and sandwiches. Diced into fresh salsa. Caramelized low and slow. Texas Early Grano is sweet enough to eat like an apple and that's exactly how you should treat it.
Seed Storage & Saving
| Variety |
Texas Early Grano Onion |
| Type |
Heirloom · Open-Pollinated |
| Seeds per packet |
~150 seeds |
Storing unused seeds: Keep somewhere cool, dark, and dry. Onion seed loses viability fast. Buy fresh seed every season for reliable germination rates.
Seed saving: Onions are insect-pollinated and will cross freely with other onion varieties nearby. Isolate by at least a quarter mile for reliable purity, or grow only one variety at a time. Onions are biennial. They set seed in their second year. After harvest, select the best bulbs and store them through summer, then replant in fall. Let them bolt and flower. Once the seed heads are dry and the black seeds are visible, cut the stalks, bring inside to finish drying, then shake or rub the seeds out. Store in a cool, dark place.
