Sprouts: The Tiny Powerhouses

How the leaves come out from the sprouts

In one of our last posts, we separated and planted the sprouts, watching them grow into full-fledged onion plants. But have you ever stopped to think about what makes these sprouts so special?

Today, we’re going to take a closer look at these tiny wonders and uncover the secrets behind their remarkable growth. So, what makes sprouts miniature plants, and what can we learn from them?

Studying a sprouted onion with emerging leaves is a great way to learn about how they grow. And we’re lucky to have a perfect specimen!

Upon gently peeling away several layers of the dry papery and fleshy leaves, we reached the 8th layer, revealing the two hidden sprouts beneath (9).

We labeled the two sprouts A and B for closer observation.

Let’s take a closer look at sprout B, which is smaller and hasn’t yet unfurled its leaves. We’ll start by gently removing the white and purplish fleshy leaf that’s wrapped around it, which is actually a remnant from the mother onion.

As we carefully peel it away, we’re left with a white, tubular sheath that has a green tip along with the stems of both the new and old onion.

We’ll refer to one side of the sprout as the ‘inner side’. This is because this side was originally attached to the other sprout, and we made a cut here to separate the two sprouts.

Take a closer look at sprout B and notice the tiny opening on the inner side. This small opening is the only exit route for the green leaves still inside the tubular sheath.

We carefully made a small slit near the tiny opening, extending it down towards the stem. Gently opening it up revealed the green leaves tucked inside the tubular sheath.

It’s possible that initially, this tiny hole was larger, matching the circumference of the new bud stem. Over time, the onion white tubular sheath may have closed in, leaving behind only a small opening for new leaves to emerge.

If this is the case, the process might repeat for every emerging leaf. The onion leaves grow very rapidly during sprouting. New leaves emerge before the outer tubular sheath can close.

As a result, we’re left with a picture of white, tubular sheaths wrapped around each green leaf, just like in the picture.

Take a look at the tiny plant on the right-hand side of the picture. It has a new bud stem. It has the white tubular sheath which will become the pseudo-stem and expose the green leaves to the sun to produce food for the plant and eventually form the onion at the base. This tiny sprout has all the parts of a big onion plant. So, a tiny sprout is a miniature onion plant.