How much longer till my garlic grow into a single bulb?
Ariel (Zone: 7b)
3 years ago
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cindy-6b/7a VA
3 years agoAriel (Zone: 7b)
3 years agoRelated Discussions
Tilling up the ground...how much...how little?
Comments (32)I talked to a guy in FL once about his worm farm long ago. In a nut shell he said that earth worms are like any other wild critter in that they hang out where the environment is conducive to their growth and that if where they are becomes unsuitable, they can and will move, many feet a day, until they find a new spot. Too bad I don't remember all the specifics he rattled off about soil temp, moisture and so on. From experience here I can say they really love living in the soil under the wood chip mulch under the fruit trees and under the compost pile....See Moregrowing garlic for personal use with long term storage in mind
Comments (30)hi mark, glad to hear you did well, but i am not surprised, you are a genius at growing anything! now how's that money tree going? get any seeds yet? :) i am NOT a fan of mel bartholowmay (sp?) and his square foot gardening. i know people swear by it, i swear at it! for some things it's ok for others it is a disaster. maybe i did it wrong, any guess what a 4' X 4' square of bush string beans planted 2 or 4" on center looks like? it's a horror show. that said, i'm a big advocate of using 4' sq beds for some things. my garlic did fantastic! i grew garlic in '95 and '96 and it was a small amount, 1st year ok the 2nd was not good so i gave up. this past fall i allocated 4' X 12' for garlic (same as onions). i used my 6" onion planting guide to plant the garlic. i had 10 or 11 rows of music, 5 or 6 rows of german white, 2 rows of georgian crystal, 2 rows of an unknown hard neck i got at a health food store and 2 rows of softneck from stop and shop, the cloves for the sn were HUGE. of the hardnecks, 3 or 4 plants grew funky, maybe 2 or 3 never came up. of the sn, 1/2 did not come up and compared to the hn it did poorly tho ok. i dug it all about 7/25 and dried it in my shed. i trimmed the roots and stalks on friday. i did very well! i did have a problem (only with german white and only 8 or 10 bulbs with about 30+ that are fine) so i went to the farmers market looking for the farmer i bought my garlic from to ask about it but he was not there. so far i have not been able to get him on the phone. i did ask a few farmers why happened and the concensus was that i watered too much. my problem was that only the german white had 8 bulbs that had a white mold or fungus around the stalk within the bulb. the cloves were firm but looked water logged, a sort of translucent pearly grey color. the other 30 or so german white were ok. all the other garlic was ok from what i can discern. i did mulch with 5-6" of 1 or 2 year old shredded leaves, removing all but 1" in late march (which was too late but that did not harm anything). i thought that the leaves introduced the problem but then all the garlic should have had it. these guys told me they do not water their garlic, it rains enough here in the spring and summer to suffice. all the sources i read always said to keep it evenly moist but i 100% discount that now. unless we go for 3 weeks without rain, i will not water garlic again. however, if you saw the size of the hardneck bulbs they were selling you'd laugh. my german white has some cloves that are so huge that 1 clove is 2/3 the size of their entire bulb! i am not kidding you. my music cloves are just about the same tho i think the german white has larger cloves while music has larger bulbs, more cloves per bulb. my bulbs are about 2.5 to 3" in diameter, theirs were about 1.5 to 1.75"! so like i wonder about watering, you know :)! still, one guy told me garlic originated in siberia and they have wicked dry weather so the no watering does make sense. i harvested about 160 bulbs out of about 175 cloves planted. i used 48 sq feet of garden. to compare, i used 120 sq feet for potatoes. i grew 13 superior and 13 yukon gold and got a WHOOPING, SIT DOWN, HOLD ONTO YOUR HAT, 15 pounds of superior and 16 pounds of yukon gold and i use a soaker hose around the seed for adequate water. prior to that, my potatoes were often hollow or very small, so the soaker hose helps. garlic requires only cutting the scape and virtually no weeding with 1" of mulch. digging is easy. potatoes require work to plant, 2 or 3 hillings which is a lot of work in the heat, usually a lot of work killing colorodo potatoe beetles tho i saw only 12-18 this year and no larvae and the digging to get the potatoes is really hard work especially with a soaker hose in there. so i wasted 120 sq feet again! this fall i plan on planting at least 100 sq feet of garlic, NO potatoes, i may plant 125-130 sq feet. i plant 6" on center. i know from experience that if you crowd onions you get small bulbs. my red wings and copra are much larger now that i space them 4" on center vs the 3" i used to use. i suspect garlic is the same. i gather you used 6' too using the crw? storage is something only time will tell. i don't know what to make of the taste of all my garlics. georgian crystal is mild. the others are not like grocery store garlic which is HOT and SPICY. it is what i am used to. some of my cloves have been hot but most are so so. not sure what to make of this. but it is organic, it will be free once i grow enough to plant and eat for the whole year. this is why i need to buy garlic cuz i'd have to plant too much of the harvest based upon the amount i want to plant/grow next season, maybe 3/4! the guy i buy from charges just $4 a pound and he is organic!!!!! one of the guys i talked to at the farmers market told me he wholesales his to whole foods and he is organic and he gets $6.50 a pound, wholesale!!!!! so i gotta find the guy i dealt with last summer for about 30 pounds of garlic and that'd be $120! but i think that would allow me to have enought to plant and eat all year. yes, it was very successful and i am very pleased with the results. garlic is easy to grow. the hardest part is cutting the scapes when it's 90 and humid but anything is difficult under those conditions! as a side note, ever grow grandfather ashlock (i'm on tomatoes now)? i tried it this year and it is 1 heck of a fantastic tomato rivaling earl's faux! tom's yellow wonder was the only other new variety i grew this year and it too is quite good. i am not a fan of yellow tomatoes but tyw is very good. the 1st 1 i ate i would have thought it was a red tomato it had such good flavor. they are huge too 1 to 3 pounds. tom...See MoreHow should I start growing garlic
Comments (3)Hi Carol , I live in Louisiana and love to grow garlic. My sister lives in Hendersonville Tn, and they grow garlic also with no problems. Look , will tell you what I know , and you can go from there . I would just go to the grocery store , buy a bulb of garlic and break it apart , plant it in the flower bed , it is a beautiful plant and will grace any flower garden !I plant about Sept and then dig it the following July , after the bloom has turned brown. When it is dug , there are little brown things left in the ground ,and it will produce a garlic plant in the spring ! So dear one , you never have to plant in that space again , just be sure and dig it each fall , and reap the harvest . ok , now for a little info , when you buy garlic it is in a big Bulb , you break that apart and you have cloves , when you plant the cloves , in late summer , it will multiply and so when you dig it , there will be the bulbs again , also you will find in the ground ,balls bigger than a marble , that is also garlic, and I cook with that also . Then like I told you , there are little brown garlic things that are to hard to cut up , so leave them in the ground for next Julys harvest . Unless you are as crazy about garlic as I am , you will only need about 2 bulbs of garlic when you buy at the grocery . Now , I dig the garlic at the last of July and hang the stalks in the rafter of the shed so they can dry and don't touch anything . When they are dry , I break off the roots and dirt , cut off the stalk and put them in a tupperware container in the freezer . I love having fresh garlic on hand , but grow too much , so have put them in the freezer for years now , with no problem . Do not wash the garlic untill ready to cook . Remember your other flower plants and roses love garlic to grow close to them, keeps the bugs out , or so I think .The garlic stalk and bloom will remind you of Allium .... ALL the luck in the world to you , and hope to hear next July that you have a Bumper crop of garlic. Leta...See MoreMy Pitiful Garlic Harvest
Comments (30)Hey Rockwhisperer, saw your harvest and i am pretty sure you'll need to work harder this time. After going through the comments and your post, I thought maybe suggest you some keypoints that you can keep in mind while planting Garlic. Garlic can be planted in the spring as soon as the ground can be worked, but fall planting is recommended for most gardeners. Garlic roots develop in the fall and winter, and by early spring they can support the rapid leaf growth that is necessary to form large bulbs. Ensure soil is well-drained with plenty of organic matter. Select a sunny spot. A sandy, clay loam is best. In heavier soil, plant it in raised beds that are two to three feet wide and at least 10 to 12 inches tall. In areas that get a hard frost, plant garlic as early as 6 to 8 weeks before the first expected fall frost date, before the ground freezes. The timing may vary with local climate; the aim is to give a long enough period before the ground freezes for the plant to develop good roots, but not enough time to for it to form top growth before freezing temperatures set in. In northern climates, planting is usually between September and November. In southern areas, February or March is a better time to plant. Lime the soil if you haven’t done so recently. Before planting cloves, work a couple tablespoons of 5-10-10 complete fertilizer, bone meal or fish meal into the soil several inches below where the base of the garlic will rest. Select healthy large clovers, free of disease. The larger the clove, the bigger the bulb you will get the following summer. Break apart cloves from bulb a few days before planting, but keep the papery husk on each individual clove. Do not plant cloves from the grocery store. They may be unsuited varieties for your area, and most are treated to make their shelf life longer, making them harder to grow. Instead, get cloves from a mail order seed company or a local nursery. Place cloves 2 to 4 inches apart and 2 inches deep, in their upright position (the wide root side facing down and pointed end facing up). Plant in rows spaced 10 to 14 inches apart. A single 10-foot row should yield about five pounds of the fragrant bulbs. In the spring, as warmer temperatures come, shoots will emerge through the ground. Here is the link to a Video--> https://youtu.be/4BqLuil1ICw And here is a link to a website where you can watch more videos on how you can have a good harvest of garlics--> https://artisanslist.com/watch/...See MoreLoneJack Zn 6a, KC
3 years agorobert567
3 years agoPatrick Lazzara
3 years agoDonna R
3 years ago
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