small onions

As stated in another comment, I have suffered from Onion White Rot in my garden for a few years. Last year I treated the soil and hope with TLC in planting and after care that my onions this year are going to be ok.
To monitor the situation closely I planted all my onions in one bed and tried a variety ( all grown from seed ), Red, White, Traditional and Shallots. All have received the same treatments, Water Feed etc..
The Shallots, White & Traditional onions look as if they are thriving but the Reds are really disapointing as only a few have filled out and most are no larger than a golf ball, this only goes to show that no matter what you do to some varities in your garden they will not thrive. It is trial and error as to what we can successfuly grow and as long as we learn from the mistakes and pitfalls made we can learn and eradicated the next year. Other than the variety of Red onion not being suited to my soil there is no obvious reason that they have not grown.
We live and learn - that's the fun of gardening.

My onions are also very small and disappointing this year, particularly red, so you are not alone.
I just read Terry Walton's book (My life on hillside allotment) he recommends regular watering of onions to make sure they grow well - I didn't know that, they normally seem to look after themselves but the crucial difference is we had a very cold start to the year followed by two quite long dry spells, so I am putting the lack of size down to late planting and lack of water. In the last 3 years it has been very wet in summer which has meant less watering so I'm just not used to doing it, I haven't really watered my onions much, have been concentrating beans and squashes. Most of my neighbours' onions seem to be doing very well, but they are all on more established plots than mine, which I took over in a very neglected state in 2007, so I suspect their soil is in much better condition.

Have you feed your onions? Have you put manure in the ground and treaded the ground down when you planted out in March/April? The best feed for onions is nitrate of chalk, but not too much. I had big onions but thieves came along and got most of them, so I have dug up the rest. I have still got onions left but for how long is anyones guess. Same with our carrots they have been pulled up and taken with half left in the ground, and the same with our strawberries taken. If you want some good onions start preparing the ground in October for next years crop. This is the second year we have had own onions taken and they were big. Have onions growing fine at the moment from seed sown in January and planted out end of May, and has overtaken the onion sets I put in March this year. Approximate size at the moment about 1lb in weight, hope they don't get stolen as I would want to show them in the August Show. Also growing some giant cabbages.

What effect does all that theft have on your state of mind? It must be very disheartening after putting in so much effort to see everything 'walk'?

If anyone wants to grow decent onions just google mammoth onions and follow the instructions on bed preparation and the firm which I am not prepared to name here have been growing mammoth onions ON THE SAME PLOT FOR MORE THAN 100 years
Their advice is excellent
My own advice is if the bed is properly prepared extra feeding should not be necessary if it is,give high nitrogen feed till end of june then change to high potash
Best of luck
Al