Onions, planting in fall?

I just got through cleaning up my bed of weeds garlic bed polyculture in before garlic  decide to resprout for the fall growing season. I took the bulbils from last growing season, spread the out to cover the surface of remainder of that side of the bed, and covered them up with layer of pine needles.

Here, garlic sprouts in fall and continues to grow all winter. I began to wonder, would onions do the same? According to Harvesting History, yes. Though the resulting onions do not store as well as spring planted onions. I just want some onions!

Onions should be planted twice a year – once in the fall and once in the spring. The fall-planted onions can be harvested throughout the summer and early fall. The spring-planted onions can be harvested throughout the fall and early winter.

I will have to try this out! In the past, I have done very poorly with onions, even sets. I believe this to be a me problem, not my land. For one thing, I can't tell the difference between a tiny tiny chufa sprout and an onion sprout. My my poor onions are overwhelmed with allopathy.

So, enter the seed snail roll. As we are still in the seasonal drought, I'll be burying my snail to take advantage of Hunny's current watering habit. The seed trays dry out too fast in this weather.

Seems like a great idea - certainly worth a shot! Keep us posted, please?

I've never been great with growing onions - then I found out that there are three types - "long day",  "short day" and "intermediate"  and each likes different amounts of daylight to form proper bulbs. If your garlic does well over winter, the short or intermediates might be the thing.
Northern hemisphere varieties are a complete mystery to me but this looked helpful:- https://www.nybg.org/blogs/plant-talk/2014/04/tip-of-the-week/mighty-onions/

Thank you Jill, i've been trying to find a nice onion that will grow well for me. This is essential information.
As a seed saver i watch my onions. I take them out when they die back, so they don't rot and put them back in the soil when they sprout naturally. I want the succesful ones to go to seed, so i can have a continuum going , cost effective way of growing onions...
My egyptian walking onions do not need to be out of the soil for a long time and definitely grow all autumn and winter. I've been multiplying a few years.

Onions are one plant that is easy for me to plant and grow.

We buy what is called Vidalia Onion sets when available:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vidalia_onion

I grow a bunch of different onions and fall is an excellent time for planting onions (and garlic) in the Pacific Northwest.

Egyptian walking onion bulbs can be harvested from the top of the plant right now and replanted. Walla Walla sweet  onions can be started from seed now in trays (which I just did) and then transplanted by early October. Green bunching onions can be "harvested" from the store, the tops used in meals and then you can replant the bottom part of the stems with the roots attached. Garlic is also traditionally planted in the Northwest in September and October. I grow Transylvanian- it helps keeps the vampires away.

Here's a link to an excellent article from Johnny's Selected Seeds about Long-Day, Intermediate-Day and Short-Day onions that includes a map:

https://www.johnnyseeds.com/growers-library/vegetables/onions/onion-bulbing-daylength-latitude-map.html

My spring sown onions didn't do very well this year (but I've never been very successful anyway), with the exception of two that got transplanted in to a container with cherry tomatoes--I speculate these had extra good soil/compost and extra watering, resulting in my only two big bulbs.

I'm trying autumn sown ones this year too, with a specific variety I can't remember!  But it's supposed to do well over winter, though the seed company suggests saving half for spring sowing just in case the autumn sowing fails.  I may put some of them in the containers and some in the ground and see how it goes;  and I've saved half the seed, as prompted.

I planted Egyptian walking onions along with garlic in the autumn and they're thriving now in winter. I think all the 'soup' veggies all like the cooler weather. They seem to taste better. I know leeks like the same.

There is a technique used in the UK where leeks are sown in a seed bed late spring. By September they are around 8" to 10" high and are then planted in 2" diameter holes x 12" deep on 12" centers, diamond pattern. Left to over winter and then they are harvested Spring of the next year. Note that UK winters are very mild compared to most of the continental US. I've always wanted to try this out in Iowa, but never got around to it. Alliums are pretty hardy, but the problem would be a tendency to bolt the next year. Perhaps fixable with some selective breeding?

I tried growing onions a couple of times with sprouted ones, but they got too much water and so I know what I did wrong.  So I got a walking onion start from Paul Wheaton in late summer (Sept.) and planted it and ignored it as he suggests.  So far nothing, but maybe it will still be a success.