Garlic bulb size for planting

I have just cleaned and sorted my garlic harvest. In preparing for fall planting- does it matter what size cloves I use? I know when planting potatoes we are told it isn't necessary to use big ones. I have all sizes of garlic, and have never kept records of the results. Thanks-

Use the biggest outside cloves for your varieties and save the rest for cooking. Wait until planting time to separate the head. Clove size will determine head size the following year. If you grow hardnecks with few cloves, and they are all large, I'd say use them all but softnecks tend to have smaller cloves after the outside group.

oh oh- too late- I already separated the culbs! I'll just have to take my chances-I'll use the biggest ones. I usually have a pretty good harvest- I add composted steer manure each year a few months prior to planting.

I will be planting my garlic on September 26th during the NEW MOON.
I normally buy a large bag of garlic at Sam's Club for $4 and that's it !
Harvest in May.

I plant hardnecks only, and plant in October and harvest in June or July (depending on the weather). One year I planted garlic I separated the cloves early, too. I speparated them because I wanted at the small bulbs to eat. The bulbs sat for about a month before they got planted out. They did fine.

Hi,
Could ya'll answer some garlic planting questions, please?
►How much depth and space does it take to grow garlic?
►Can they be done in a shallow box-container, like a clear plastic under bed storage bin, about 6-8" deep?
►What are the soil requirements? fertilizer?
►Do they like organic soil/compost?
►What's the difference between hard and soft neck garlic?
►Which end of the garlic get planted in the soil, and how deep do you plant the cloves?

Thanks!

Linda

Gymgirl - I stick my thumb into the dirt, drop in a large clove, pointy end UP, and cover. I set them 4" to 6" apart. As to soil requirements, mine get whatever is there, although I do add organic fertilizer under each clove.

I don't remember the difference between hardneck and softneck, except one stores longer than the other, and I don't know the answer your under the bed storage bin question, except I'm 100% sure they won't grow under the bed! LOL

Next to sweet potatoes, garlic is the easiest vegetable to grow (in my opinion.)

1. I usually plant as deep or up to twice as deep as the size of the clove and four inches apart. The colder the climate the deeper folks seem to plant.
2. I'm not sure about the shallow box but I'd say if you're using inexpensive store garlic give it a try. Deepest box possible.
3. They like rich, fertile soil best but do okay in poor soil. Soil fertility will definitely influence head size along with the size of the clove.
4. Hardneck and sofneck garlic each include many varieties. A hardneck is one with a stiff, woody scape (flower stem). When you remove the cloves you will be left with a rigid stick in the middle. A softneck does not have that woody stem. Different garlic varieties are recommended for different areas depending on climate. Each has advantages and disadvantages. Softnecks usually do best in hotter climates and hardnecks in cooler ones. There are crossover regions (like mine) where both can be grown. Still, some will do better than others in any given area. The pros and cons are too lengthy to discuss here but that info is readily available on line.
5. The clove is planted "foot" side down and pointy side up. The foot is the part with the fuzz; actually the old dried roots.

I have experience with store garlic and the brown skinned garlic that was on this property when we got our place many years ago. I am experimenting, along with Cindy from Eatonton, GA, with new heirloom varieties for the first time this year (actually next year). Her zone is one or two warmer than mine here in the N. GA mountains. We both attended a recent garlic festival near my home in N. GA and paid seventeen dollars a pound for European heirloom garlic. They had softneck and hardneck available. I usually pay $1.39 a pound at the Atlanta International Mkt.. I'd say try some softnecks (no woody stick protruding from the center) and make sure when you buy heads the cloves are as big as possible.

Good info here on garlic- I'm glad I started the thread! I love my garlic!

Thanks, to you all for the quick response! I'll be growing onions at the end of October, so I may wait until then to set the onions, too.

EIGHT months to harvest garlic? The onions only take six!

If you have a designated space outside the main veggie garden maybe use that. You can cut the scapes before flowering to make bigger heads but if you don't mind small ones you can plant some among your perennials and let them flower. I usually let some of mine flower because they are those beautiful, lavender allium balls.

My onions take four - set first week of March, harvest end of June.

Yes, garlic takes eight months, I set the cloves end of October and pull them along with the onions in June.

This year, I set some onions along the edges of a raised bed where I later transplanted melons. Both did well. I was concerned that the melons might taste of onions, but they didn't. I would have eaten them anyway! LOL

Are ya'll familiar with "Society" Garlic? It's part of my landscape design plan, and will border the edge of a flowerbed. It makes little purple flowers, and will take on the appearance sort of like a monkey grass border (but not as dense...). Looking forward to edible landscaping!

I've not planted anything yet...

Wish I could plant vegetables in place of the front lawn, but deer would invite all their dear (pun intended) friends for a free feast.

Our bathroom window overlooks the front lawn, and at night I frequently see deer eating the neighbor's grass. Last evening it was a mother with her son and daughter.

I have several clumps of five year old Society garlic and am disappointed. It is not a true garlic and is questionably edible (as in some people get an upset stomach after consumption). After reading several sources that said not to eat it we haven't. Mine does have the tufts and one or two flower heads per clump, but it is not floriferous. I'd not have bought it had I known. On the other hand, garlic chives are easy to cultivate and loaded with white flowers this time of year. They spread outwards and are edible. They do not have the same tufted form as Society garlic though.

MaypopLaurel,
Thanks for the feedback on the Society Garlic. I know NOTHING about landscaping, and went to a professional who drew a hand sketch of what should go where.

The Society Garlic is to be grown as an edging along a 3-4 ft. long portion of a bed that sits along the south fence. The plan calls for curly leaf parsley planted directly behind the SG. The bed space there is roughly 3 ft wide from the sidewalk to the fence.

Is there some other landscape edible you might recommend that would not be invasive or spread down the entire bed? Would the chives spread too much?

Linda

re: Society Garlic- IMHO it smells awful! In past years when I worked in nurseries I always hated to get any of it in, because it had such a bad smell. I can walk into a garden shop and tell you whan there is some around!

If you are looking for edible landscaping, Linda, I'd look at garlic chives. I'm leaving Maypop tomorrow but will try and remember to take a photo. They are agreeable to spreading but far from invasive. As for curly parsley, it is IMO nice to look at but only useful as a garnish. The flavor is really lacking. Garlic chives are perennial but the parsley needs to be planted every year to get a good effect. Though not frilly, regular parsley is the one used in a cook's kitchen. Your landscape designer is apparently looking at the aesthetic side of your edible garden. What is edible and what is best and most flavorful are not always compatible. Not seeing your planting space I can't advise, but for low plantings beets make lovely leaves and behind them chards. I like to stick big pots in empty spaces with rosemary, lavender or thyme spilling. They enjoy the good drainage and can be moved around to hide failed good intentions. :>)

JoParrot and MaypopLaurel,
Thanks for the practical advice. I'm not looking to have to replace edibles not worth eating! The garlic chives and beetroot ideas are spot on. Except I LOVE the beet tops!

Oh my. How do I keep my edibles and eat them, too??!! I guess I could do a close planting of beets and thin them as I go, huh?

Here's what I've done in the past. Chioggia and Bull's Blood Beets.

Nasturtiums have edible, flowers, seeds and leaves, and have a peppery taste.

Bee,
We have another bed that's to have nasturtiums and marigolds in it. Edible leaves!

Here are the promised photos. Keep in mind it is three days after being beaten down with five inches of rain from hurricane Lee.

They are past peak bloom and flower heads are setting seed.

No, same photo. Sorry. Hope this is right.

Here is a close up of the flowers. DM if interested in seed or divisions.

Laurel, if that is society garlic there is also a tri color variegated one- lavender, green & white- pretty, maybe, but still stinky in my opinion!

No, Jo, I should have said that is garlic chives. I didn't photo the society garlic. It's not on my favs list. Now we have left the topic of true garlic and I don't claim to be an expert but I am going for a higher degree in the subject. Notice the credentials are current.

Laurel - I think that's a fire fly in your last photo. I often find them napping on various plants during June and July.

The garlic chives flowers are very pretty, I'll have to consider planting some seed next year.

Thanks a bunch MaypopLaurel!

I'll let you know about the plants!

Linda

Welcome, Linda.

Honey, fireflies love garlic chives, okra and maypops.

Laurel -

Hi,

I am getting ready to plant my garlic. 2nd year for them. They did pretty good for a beginner. So, now I am wondering how to prep the bed for them. Last year I did nothing. Just stuck them in. What do you think about composted chicken manure. I have a few bags out there and thought it might be good to put one on the garlic bed????

Thanks so much for your help.

They love manure.

Thank you. I'll do it. I didn't dig my garlic (hard neck) until September tho and I had planted it the first of October. Did I leave it too long?

I don't think you can do that (leave it in too long). I've been planting new garlic in revitalized beds for several weeks now but keep coming across dormant bulbs of old garlic. I'll put those back when time allows and I make a bed for them. They need their own home because they were on our property when we bought it twenty-some years ago and some are a more unusual brown skinned variety that I have no name for. Garlic likes rich soil so the ones left with no attention make a few cloves or a single pointy onion-shaped clove. Still good though.

I've seen some of those but thought they were elephant garlic or something like that.

Jnette you want to harvest before the outter wrappers split and expose the cloves to the dirt. This affects the storage life adversly.11 months will split all the wrappers here in Western Washington. I have heard of people just washing it well and freezing it but I have never frozen mine. Maybe some one who freezes it will come alonfg and tell us if this is so; I wonder what google would say.

LOL Google says
Perhaps the easiest way to preserve garlic is to freeze it. Just peel the cloves and place them in freezer bags in the freezer. Easier yet, simply place the unpeeled garlic in freezer bags and remove as needed. With both these methods, the cloves become a little mushy when they are thawed, but their flavor remains good.

Another method for freezing garlic is to chop it and wrap it tightly in plastic wrap. With this method, you can simply grate or break off small amounts of chopped garlic as needed, which is helpful for cooks who often must quickly throw a meal together.

I grind my garlic in a small electric grinder, then put it in ice cube trays that I only use for garlic-each hole holds 1 Tablespoon. After they are frozen I pop them into ziploc freezer bags, and can use as many as I need later. Works great for me.

Very interesting. What about these little bottles of minced garlic you can buy? Is that sealed? Maybe vacuum sealed? Wonder if they put something in them to keep from spoiling.

Have you ever heard of freezing horse radish? Wonder what google would say about that.

Just checked and I don't see anything gained by freezing it. You have to use it with 6 weeks anyway. The fresh hr is soooo good.

I have used the bottled minced garlic long ago, but compared to what I freeze- no taste at all. Something is added to preserve it-