Onion as Weather Forecaster

It’s a grand day, isn’t it? Not here of course. We keep getting rainstorm after rainstorm and already have much flooding in the north and east of Thailand. It’s already a metre (3 feet or so) deep in some towns and slowly flowing south and west towards Bangkok. Anyway, fill your mug and then fill your other mug with a virtual muffin or pastry. Y’know…people always talk about the weather but Ken Peters has a somewhat unusual way of telling if it’s going to rain or not.

When Ken Peters predicts the coming year’s precipitation, he’s moved to tears. That’s because he uses an onion for his prognostication. He divides the onion into sections, puts salt on each section and then “reads” the prediction for upcoming moisture.

Peters has performed the annual ritual for 15 years. He started the event when he farmed near Wagner and has continued it since he retired and moved to Scotland in 2006.

 “The lady who got me started said you set up an onion on Christmas Eve, around 4 p.m.,” he said. “You put salt on the onion (sections), then go to church or just let it set for a couple of hours. Then you look at the onion.”

He prefers a larger onion to provide adequately sized sections for the “forecast.”
“It should be a South Dakota onion. It can be any color onion — white, yellow, purple,” he said.

Once the onion has been chosen, Peters cuts his “patient” vertically down the middle. Peters divides the onion into a dozen parts, with each representing a month. He spreads the sections onto a tray.

“You put the two outside, largest sections in opposite corners of the tray. One represents January, and the other one December,” he said. “You keep doing that until you have three rows, with the corresponding sections facing each other.”

Each section forms a cup, with Peters placing a half-teaspoon or teaspoon of table salt in each cup. When it comes to finding out the onion’s forecast, Peters literally peels away each layer.

“You want to leave intact the onion skin that divides each section,” he said. “If the onion skin is off, then the salt gets directly on the onion.”

After two hours, Peters checks the salt on each section. If the salt remains dry, the corresponding month will see below-normal precipitation. If the salt becomes wet and cakes into a small ball, that month will see above-normal moisture.

Peters admits the onion isn’t scientific, but he can’t explain the results.

“You would think it should be right about 50 percent of the time,” he said. “But when I look back over the years, it’s been 75 to 80 percent accurate. There must be some merit.”

Well if you ask me, this is scientific enough that the Thai government in Bangkok ought to be using it to predict how much rain they are going to get and make it an integral part of their flood prevention plan. We're dry enough here but elsewhere it's shaping up to be another flooded fall. I just hope it doesn’t hit the airport until after our flight out on November 2nd. Where'd I put my rubber duck?

See ya, eh!

Bob