The most commonly used method is to plant a clove. Each individual clove will grow a new bulb of garlic. Note: The clove is the small section that makes up the bulb.
I had a friend who was following a recipe for garlic cheese dip. Instead of adding 2 cloves of garlic, she added 2 bulbs of garlic.
Plant each clove flat end down, pointed side up two inches deep. Space them about 6 inches apart. You can expect to see growth in weeks. If you are planting hardneck garlic, you can plant the bulbils from the scape. This method takes longer to grow a complete bulb. There its no need to start them inside on your windowsill like you would tomato or pepper seeds.
They are tough as nails. Just plant them in the dirt and they will grow. Growing garlic from bulbils takes a lot longer, but it has its advantages. The main advantage being that one garlic plant contains a lot more bulbils than cloves.
Growing from bulbils is also a good way to prevent soil borne diseases. Your clove will begin to grow roots, sleep for the winter, then and then restart growth in the spring. Its common practice to cut the scapes off so the plant can focus its growth on the bulb. Some growers claim that it makes for larger bulb. Others say it makes no difference.
I prefer to leave most of my bulbils on, let them burst and fall where they please. Then I have a steady supply of garlic growing with no effort on my part. This is a terrible idea if you have a small growing area. They say that garlic does not compete well with weeds. I beg to differ. Mine grows happily among the weeds and grass.
If you plan on saving your bulbils for re-planting, its best to let them stay on the stalk until they are almost ready to fall on their own. You can store them in a brown paper bag. Bulbils resemble small, round cloves. They smell very much like a clove of garlic and they can be sauteed or steamed.
They have a much milder flavor than the clove. This means its time to harvest! Dig your garlic bulb and hang them out in a shady area.
Do not wait until all the leaves have turned brown. Each leaf is relative to the wrapper around the bulb. If you have 5 leaves, then you should have 5 layers of wrapping around the bulb. If you let it dry too much before digging it, your wrapper will split underground. Wild garlic is a cold season perennial. It grows in small, grass-like clumps. Its edible, but has a very mild flavor. Many dishes that call for wild garlic use the leaves as well as the small bulb. Wild garlic can sometimes smell more like an onion.
An easy way to tell them apart is to look at the stem. Wild onions have flat stems. Wild garlic have a hollow stem. Garlic and onions are in the same family as lilies. Much like how lily of the valley can take over your yard, so too can wild garlic. Click here to find out how to get rid of it. Good post. I learn something new and challenging on sites I stumbleupon everyday. It will always be interesting to read through content from other authors and use something from other websites.
Hi, several people have asked if you need to leave the garlic planted for three years and there has been no answer — I just had to pull one up to weed around it and there is only one clove but I want a bulb. How long do I have to leave it in the ground to get a full bulb???
Hopefully somebody that knows more will help out here. By The Editors. Choosing and Preparing a Planting Site Select a gardening area that receives 6 to 8 hours of sunlight per day. Prepare soil by removing weeds and mixing in healthy additions of compost. If you plant in the spring, wait until the soil has thawed and drained.
For an easy and large harvest, garlic grower Robin Jarry of Hope, Maine, suggests using heavily mulched raised beds, especially in heavy soil. I never water my garlic—I like low-maintenance vegetables! Before planting cloves, work a couple tablespoons of complete fertilizer, bone meal or fish meal into the soil several inches below where the base of the garlic will rest.
How to Plant Garlic Get cloves from a mail order seed company or a local nursery. Do not use cloves from the grocery store for planting. They may be unsuitable varieties for your area, and most are treated to make their shelf life longer, making them harder to grow. Select large, healthy cloves, free of disease. The larger the clove, the bigger and healthier the bulb you will get the following summer. Break apart cloves from the bulb a few days before planting, but keep the papery husk on each individual clove.
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. How to Grow Garlic Northern gardeners should mulch heavily with straw to ensure proper overwintering. Read our mulching guide for more info!
Mulch should be removed in the spring after the threat of frost has passed. Keep them under cover. In the spring, as warmer temperatures come, shoots will emerge through the ground.
Cut off any flower shoots that emerge in spring. These may decrease bulb size. Fertilize garlic in the early spring by side dressing with a nitrogen-heavy fertilizer such as blood meal, chicken manure, or a store-bought pelleted fertilizer. Fertilize again just before the bulbs begin to swell in response to lengthening daylight usually early May in most regions. Weeds should not be a problem until spring. However, keep the planting site well weeded. Garlic is a heavy feeder which requires adequate levels of nitrogen.
Fertilize more if you see yellowing leaves. Water every 3 to 5 days during bulbing mid-May through June. If May and June are very dry, irrigate to a depth of two feet every eight to 10 days. As mid-June approaches, taper off watering. White Rot is a fungus that may attack garlic in cool weather. Not much can be done to control or prevent that problem except rotating your crops and cleaning up the area after harvesting.
The spores can live in the soil for many years. The fungus affects the base of the leaves and roots. In Southern climates, it will depend on your planting date. The clue is to look for yellowing foliage. Harvest when the tops just begin to yellow and fall over, but before they are completely dry.
Lift a bulb to see if the crop is ready. We often dig up a bulb before the tops are completely yellow in late June or early July as some garlic types will be ready earlier. The garlic head will be divided into plump cloves and the skin covering the outside of the bulbs will be thick, dry and papery. If pulled too early, the bulb wrapping will be thin and disintegrate.
If left in the ground too long, the bulbs sometimes split apart. The skin may also split, which exposes the bulbs to disease and will affect their longevity in storage.
Avoid damaging the roots and especially the root-plate where they attach to the bulb. Lift the plants, carefully brush off surplus soil but do not remove any foliage or roots before putting them to dry thoroughly. Let them cure in an airy, shady, dry spot for two weeks. We hang them upside down on a string in bunches of 4 to 6 or you can leave them to try on a home-made rack made from chicken wire stretched over posts.
Make sure all sides get good air circulation. After a few weeks, the garlic should be totally dry and ready to store … How to Store Garlic The bulbs are cured and ready to store when the wrappers are dry and papery and the roots are dry. The root crown should be hard, and the cloves can be cracked apart easily.
Once the garlic bulbs are dry, you can store them. Trim off any roots or leaves. Keep the wrappers on—but remove the dirtiest wrappers.
Remove the tops and roots. Do not store garlic in the refrigerator, either. The flavor will increase as the bulbs are dried. Properly stored, garlic should last until the next crop is harvested the following summer. If you plan on planting garlic again next season, save some of your largest, best-formed bulbs to plant again in the fall.
Hardneck varieties are extremely cold hardy so opt for these if your winters are harsh. The scapes themselves are an early summer treat, delicious as chopped into salads or added to stir-fries. Hardnecks grow one ring of cloves around a stem, there is not a layer of cloves as there is in softneck varieties. While they are cold hardy, hardnecks do not store as well or long as other varieties. Flavor is milder than softnecks.
These varieties produce tiny bulblets at the end of a tall flowering stalk in addition to a fat underground bulb of cloves. Softneck varieties, like their name suggests, have necks that stay soft after harvest, and therefore are the types that you see braided. Softnecks are especially recommended for those in warmer climes, as it is less winter-hardy than other types.
They have strong, intense flavor and tend to grow bigger bulbs because energy is not being diverted to top-set bulblets like hardnecks. The flavor is more like onion than traditional garlic. Bulbs and cloves are large, with about 4 cloves to a bulb.
See our complete video that demonstrates how to grow and how to harvest garlic! Rub raw garlic on an insect bite to relieve the sting or itch. You can also harvest just the green scapes of hardneck garlic varieties.
Hot summer weather triggers bulb maturation, shutting down foliage growth in preparation for dormancy. One is when a bit more than half of the lower leaves turn yellow and dry out. Hardneck varieties will have leaves that brown and dry, but retain an upright flower stem. With softnecks, all of the leaves will flop over as bulbs mature. Or, you can dig up a couple of bulbs around mid-July and check their size.
To harvest, loosen the soil around and under the roots with a garden fork or hand trowel. Provide up to 12 inches of ease out from the plant stem to avoid damaging bulbs. Gently grasp the neck of each plant close to the bulb and work it out of the soil.
Avoid pulling hard on the leaves if the bulbs are resistant. Instead, work your fingers under the base of the bulb and gently lift to release from the soil. Read more about harvesting garlic here. Curing is the term for the thorough drying required for flavors to develop fully, and it helps to ensure a long storage life, free from discoloration and rot. Just clean, peel, and enjoy — no need to wait to complete the curing process!
Freshly harvested garlic typically has a milder flavor than cured bulbs. You can even pull up whole plants in spring, preparing and eating the undeveloped bulbs like leeks. Bulbs can be dried whole with the scapes still attached and braided into attractive bunches. Or, you can clip them off after harvest — just make sure you leave 7 or more inches of stalk attached to the bulb, which will help it to cure by drawing moisture away from the cloves.
If the stalk still feels moist and pliant, allow bulbs to cure for another week or two before storing. If you clipped your garlic instead, store it in loose piles in containers that permit airflow — preferably in breathable crates, boxes, or shelves.
Bamboo steamers make handy storage containers for bulbs. Curing can take anywhere from 4 to 6 weeks. You can then cut off any leftover plant material and store as you like — in a dry basket in a cool, dark cupboard, or in a paper bag in the fridge. Being careful to keep them intact and without breaking them up into cloves, set aside the largest heads in a dark and dry place for use as seed next year.
Use the smaller ones in your cooking. Read more about curing and storing garlic here. One of the best and most obvious reasons to grow it in your own backyard is for culinary purposes! Crush, slice, mince, chop, or throw whole cloves into your desired dish for a punch of added flavor. Garlic makes a pivotal contribution to the flavor of soups, stews, and broths.
You can also roast whole heads, making them into a delicious spread for bread, or a garnish for protein dishes, roasted vegetables, or homemade pizza. Garlic is a staple ingredient in pesto, along with basil, pine nuts, olive oil, and cheese. The flavorful scapes make an excellent addition, too. Get the recipe on our sister site, Foodal. For a flavorful side dish, these parsley mashed potatoes are the smoothest and the creamiest.
Get the recipe now on Foodal. You can find the recipe on Foodal. For the very best health benefits, enjoy the cloves raw as often as you can — it can be a challenge, though! Raw cloves can have an overwhelming flavor and heat, and consuming them might cause indigestion or stomach cramps in some individuals, so be cautious. Some studies like this one have found, however, that a cold-water press of the cloves, such as in a warm or cold tea, can retain some allicin, and may work as a mild antimicrobial tisane.
It would be nowhere near as powerful as the fresh stuff, though! According to this study , consuming garlic regularly as a culinary herb provides allicin and other beneficial phytonutrients that may boost health and immunity. The bulbs also contain another potent compound called ajoene, with some studies pointing to its anti-tumor and diabetes management possibilities.
The health information in this article is not intended to assess, diagnose, prescribe, or promise cure. Consult with your health care professional before considering any plant-based remedies for your health and wellness.
Getting more garlic into your life is easy enough already: you can just go to the store, bring some home, and cook it up, in whatever way and with whatever foods you like. With your own bulbs to enjoy straight from your yard, you can feel the amazing benefits, satisfaction, and ownership of having nurtured your very own plants — and oftentimes, growing your own makes for even tastier and healthier food!
What gardening, culinary, and healing experiences have YOU had with garlic? Let us know in the comments below. See our TOS for more details. Uncredited photos: Shutterstock. Originally published on May 5, Last updated on December 5, She aims to bridge the world of natural, holistic health and nutrition to the realm of organic foods, herbalism, gardening, and sustainability - or "Food as Medicine" - throughout her writing. Hi Adrian, Thanks for your epic guide! Nice article; I planted a goodly amount this year and am starting to harvest because of some issues.
Good coverage. Hi Great article. Extremely informative. I shared with my garden group. Sliced a little bit crushed put in bandaid and cover. Garlic is a Favorite food and I also take it in supplement form.
Allium sativum and A. Softnecks Here are a few of the main softneck subspecies to consider: Silverskins These silvery-white, thin-skinned softnecks are very easy to grow, with the best storage capacity of all types. Artichokes These have thicker skins and many complex layers of cloves like an artichoke, from whence they got their name. As the hardiest softneck variety, this is a good option for growing in colder regions. Did You Know? A Note of Caution The health information in this article is not intended to assess, diagnose, prescribe, or promise cure.
For Growing, Dining, and Healing Getting more garlic into your life is easy enough already: you can just go to the store, bring some home, and cook it up, in whatever way and with whatever foods you like. More Posts Notify of.
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