I've grown them both the last couple of years. They perform at least as well as any other variety I grow, and better than some.

In my garden (and I am way down south near the Texas border), Texas Early White matures in May from a mid-February planting, maturing about the same time as Texas 1015Y. If you like having early onions, it is great. It doesn't have a real long shelf life, though, but that is typical of all sweet onions. I mostly use it for fresh eating in spring and early summer, and for making/canning salsa in June.

Texas Legend is an improved 1015Y, and one of the improvements they were seeking was to increase the levels of healthy compounds (like antioxidants and such). It is a superb onion and I've been pleased with it. I've grown 1015Y since it was introduced in the 1980s and thought I'd grow it forever, but I am likely to drop 1015Y and grow Texas Legend in its place from now on. They are so similar that there really isn't any reason to grow them both, and Texas Legend matures slightly earlier, stores longer on the shelf, and should be a healthier choice since they bred it to have more compounds that contribute to human health.

However, the big news from my onion beds this year, where I grew 9 varieties, wasn't Texas Legend or Early Texas White. The two varieties that were new to me this year, Red River and Highlander, outperformed every other onion I grew this year, both in size and in shelf life. They got huge---mostly the size of softballs, and they cured well and stored well. I was astonished by them, and I've grown lots of great onions, including TX 1015Y, Candy and Superstar, and it is not real easy for a "new" (whether it is brand new to the market or just one I haven't grown before) variety to impress me. These two not only impressed me, but impressed my friend, Fred, who is not easily impressed. Because both Red River and Highlander are Long Day varieties, you wouldn't have thought they'd do well this far south, but they did. They are real winners.

I don't know enough about sweet potato genetics to comment on what happened with your sweet potatoes, but do think it likely that, if they bloomed and were in bloom at the same time, then some cross-pollination might have occurred. I like genetic surprises like that.

Dawn

How do the red River & Highlander keep? I would like one that would store a little longer than the 1015Y. Though I can't complain because they do keep for several months. My wife chops the small ones up into diced size and puts them in the freezer to use as she needs them, quite handy that way.
It has been so long ago since the sweet potatoes made the stripes, I am almost afraid to tell anybody about it as I doubt anyone would believe me. But my grandfather who saw them was amused by it. He had been growing sweet potato's for most of his life and had never saw anything like it before. Also the striped sweet potato's bloomed nearly all summer it seemed. The only way I could figure for them to have crossed was that they had been grown together for 5-6 years and they happened to have bloomed at the same time and some insect had to have carried pollen form one to another. It was a fun surprise, my grandfather took them and showed them to other people at town and some thought he was trying to pull a prank of some kind. When cut open the striped sweet potato's were orange on the inside like regular sweet potato's. It was fun while it lasted. I had just never heard of anything like it before or since. I have some Clay Cowpeas cross with Purple Hull Peas grow in the garden this year all on the same 5-6 plants, you never know which you will get some will be colored like Clay peas and some will be colored like Purple Hull peas, some are big light tan color and some are white and then some will be small and tan. Some of the blooms will be purple and some are white all on the same bush. I got the original Clay peas from a neighbor who had both kinds growing in his garden, they just picked the purple hull ones and gave me the Clay peas because they didn't want them. The first year they all came Clay peas but this year they showed the Purple hull, they all taste the same like peas.

So far, they keep just fine. I still have plenty roughly 5 months after they were harvested. We still are eating them fresh and using them in the final round of canning that I'm doing this week. I think Dixondale's catalog says 3-5 months for Red River and 4-5 for Highlander and we're already at about 5 months, so I'm betting they'll go 6 or 7. With 1015Y, they list its storage potential as 2-3 months, but I've had them last 5-7, though not every year. In a dry year when they aren't excessively wet at harvest, with proper curing they can last a long time. I usually hang them in netting onion tubes from Dixondale, with a knot tied between each onion so they don't touch each other. Before I found the netting tubes, I used pantyhose in the same way. Sometimes I hang them in my pantry, which is underneath the staircase in the house, and I hang them way back in the back where it is dark and cool. Sometimes I hang them in the in-ground tornado shelter, and sometimes I hang them in the garage, which is unheated but well-insulated.

When they are starting to soften up and I can tell they are about to sprout, I chop them up and freeze them to make them last longer. In a year with a bumper crop, I chop up a lot and freeze them in zip-lock bags in the quantities needed to make Annie's Salsa and Habanero Gold Jelly. Right now I have a freezer full of chopped tomatoes, hot peppers, sweet peppers and onions. I could make and can salsa and jelly all winter long if I wanted to, but I doubt I'll want to. I'm about burned out on canning for this year. Two more days, maybe three, and I am done with the canning for the year. I probably could totally skip growing tomatoes and peppers next year and I'd have enough frozen, canned and dehydrated to get us through 2015.

....and I quote:

" I probably could totally skip growing tomatoes and peppers next year and I'd have enough frozen, canned and dehydrated to get us through 2015."

While I'm sure the last part of that sentence is true, the first part isn't. I don't believe you could totally stop growing tomatoes for a year. LOL

I know I cannot totally skip growing them----how would we live without fresh tomatoes? However, I am severely burned out on canning nonstop all summer long and am planning to plant a lot less tomatoes and a lot more of other stuff, particularly flowers. I love canning, but have done way too much of it the last 3 years. Planning for significantly less canning, I have to downsize the plantings accordingly, so it is unlikely I'll grow 9 onion varieties in 2015. Maybe I'll grow 3 or 4.

I have been contemplating planting only flowers and herbs in 2015, but realistically speaking, I know that doing that would make me lose my mind, so I'm contemplating going with 50% veggies (by square foot of planted space) and 50% flowers and herbs.

The roselle jelly and jam are so incredibly tasty that I'll give roselle plants more space in the 2015 garden for sure, and that space has to come from somewhere........and the somewhere likely will be in one of the beds where I usually plant tomatoes or onions. This year I tucked them into various openings as early plantings matured and finished up, including in the onion beds. Next year I am going to give them an entire raised bed of their own.