I am interested! check out my trade page. more updates coming this week, as i go through the new seeds that just arrived.

Hi Mary, I would be interested in trading. I have Red Toch, Oregon Blue, Polish White, Chinese Purple, and Inchelian Red, These are all my softneck varieties. I also have a kind called Maitake that is a hardneck that sends up a very weak scape and it matures 2 to 3 weeks earlier than any of my other Garlics. Let me know what hardnecks you have and we can work out a trade if interested. Gary

Sarah, maybe we need some definitions. I don't know any place that sells garlic for $2.50 per _clove_. When you buy garlic (whether in the shop or elsewhere), what you get is called either a bulb or a head. It is composed of smaller parts, each in it's own wrapper. Those are the cloves. Surely you meant $2.50/head? Besides which, it's a one-time purchase, not an on-going expense. A typical bulb of hardneck garlic contains, depending on variety, 6-10 cloves. Let's do a worst-case math excercise: Variety X costs $15/lb. A half pound of X contains two bulbs, each of which contains 6 large cloves. Cost of seed stock: $8.00 For the sake of discussion, let's assume 100% harvest. You will plant 12 cloves, at a cost of .66 each. You will harvest 72 cloves, bringing the cost down to .095 each. Let's assume you eat 2 of the bulbs, and replant the rest. So, the second year you will plant 60 cloves, and harvest 360 cloves, bringing the cost down to .018 each. Repeat this process, and by the third harvest the cost per clove is a virtual zero (in actuality, .0035). I use three seasons for a reason. Not only does it show how little garlic costs, long term. It deals with the localization effect Tracy refers to. Most garlic has to adapt to the local conditions in your garden. Typically it takes three years before a particular variety reaches its full potential there. So what happens is that by the third year, you are growing the best garlic possible, at, literally, no cost. BTW, if you plant on 6" centers, you would still have room for 80 plants in the 2 x 10 plot. If you plant on 5" centers, that jumps to an easy 100. A note on trading: While there are no rules, the usual practice is to trade full heads, rather than individual cloves. And the trading quantity, most often, is two heads. So, for both quantity and quality sake, figure on the second season before you start any serious trading. But keep in mind that garlic heads tend to be friendly, sharing people, who often enough will just send you a head or two of a variety. Unfortunately, we (that is, those in the U.S.) cannot send garlic to Canada (it's classed as a plant). So you'll have to find folks up there to trade/share with. But, yes, it's just like tomatoes in that you can build quite a collection just by purchasing one variety of "seed."

Hum... de ...de... I have no clue, but come this fall. Buy yourself some from one of the garlic suppliers online and you'll have success like you can't imagine. My personal advice is NOT to try and use grocery store garlic. Just spend the few extra bucks and you'll have a bucket load next summer. Just be sure and plant as directed for your area. In Indiana, we put them in the ground around October, lots of mulch!!!!!!!! HUgs, Maryanne Maryanne in In