Pregnant Onion a Fun Breeder

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Pregnant Onion a Great Breeder
E very once in a while I'd spot a little bulbous plant sitting with other cacti and succulents when I was out perusing a garden center. Eventually I picked up a small specimen and brought it home and stuck it off in the corner of the greenhouse. The plant was called a Pregnant Onion, Ornithogalum longibracteatum, and wasn't much more than a little bulb sitting on the soil with long slender leaves coming out the top.

The South Africa native is drought tolerant and wouldn't need a lot of care. And it didn't. It pretty much sat in its allotted bench space, was watered every so often and fertilized very infrequently. The intentional mistreatment seemed to pay off.

Greenhouse grown Ornithogalum longibracetuatum, Pregnant Onion with two flowering stalks developing and lots of new bulblets.
Bublets pushing through the skin of the parent plant.

Over a year's time the plant's bulb continued to grow in diameter and eventually I had to transplant into a larger pot using a quick draining soil mix. Then little bulges began to appear under the onion skin like covering on the bulb. The bulges grew, the protective covering split and new little bulblets appeared. Some fell off and eventually rooted in the soil. Before I knew it I had a population explosion. Not a bad thing, if you have friends that like to try new plants.

I'd like to say that I didn't have any trouble growing the Pregnant Onion but I did get a little careless with watering and the foliage yellowed, turned to mush at the top of the bulb and I pulled it off. I quit watering and luckily the plant recovered sending up new foliage. With the succulent nature of the bulb the plants can go a long time without water. But living in the greenhouse, with plants that needed regular watering, I may have carelessly overwatered. Now I'm very careful not to water too often not wanting the plants to rot.

Hoping to speed up development I moved the bulblets to a container of damp vermiculite where they could easily take root.
Rooted and leafed bulblets transplanted to four inch pots.
Tall, flowering stalk of the Pregnant Onion.

I had so many of the little bublets I had to open up a nursery and take care of the little guys on and individual basis. Instead of letting the bulblets develop on their own I started placing them in a small container of damp vermiculite. There they would root, and send up leaves. When ready, I'd move each small rooted bulb to a four inch pot and let them grow in the greenhouse until a friend or visitor to the greenhouse would take notice and, if wanted, I'd let them adopt one of the little plants so they could nurture their own little Pregnant Onion family.

An added bonus to the easy reproduction of the Pregnant Onion is the tall stalk and delicate flowers it's capable of producing. The small white flowers have a narrow green stripe and produce over a long period of time. Although I've designated my Ornithogalum a greenhouse plant it would do well as a houseplant provided it's not over watered and received plenty of light. I'd also try growinf it outside in a container, where it gets partial sun and make sure it was protected from freezing temperatures. (2010)

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