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Anyone else grow their own garlic?

PrimeTime said:
Yeah you gotta get in the game early!  ;)
 
One of the things I like about ordering from Filaree Farm is that I can place my order for garlic seed in the spring and give them a ship date (anytime Sep-Oct).  In the fall, they will process the orders in the order that they were made and send the best garlic heads to the people who ordered the earliest.
 
Since you guys seem to know a bit about garlic, does anyone know what kind this one is? I absolutely love it, but the packs it is sold in never really tell much apart from that most seem to call it chinese or asian. It is a single uncompartmented clove with lots of fragrance and oil but lacking the bad-mouth-characteristics that normally make it a no-go when working. Sizes range from 1.5 cm to almost 3 cm on some cloves.
 
WROQdkZ.jpg
 
Charger said:
Since you guys seem to know a bit about garlic, does anyone know what kind this one is? I absolutely love it, but the packs it is sold in never really tell much apart from that most seem to call it chinese or asian. It is a single uncompartmented clove with lots of fragrance and oil but lacking the bad-mouth-characteristics that normally make it a no-go when working. Sizes range from 1.5 cm to almost 3 cm on some cloves.
 
WROQdkZ.jpg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solo_garlic
 
Just adding my name to the garlic list.
Ive got

Gregorian Fire
Music
Lotus
Mary Jane

This is my first year with these varieties.

Last year I had great success with California White, Spanish Roja, and German Red. But my labeling was a bit lacking so I couldnt tell the difference between the German and the roja so i gave it all away in stead of regrowing it.

Nice to see a big garlic group here.
 
I was excited about music this past season but it didn't do that great for me, spanish roja was the winner. Right now I've got german red and duganski in ground.
 
Good luck!
 
Mr Clayton Forrester said:
...my labeling was a bit lacking so I couldnt tell the difference between the German and the roja so i gave it all away in stead of regrowing it.
 
 
I had a similar issue last year.  I had three varieties, two in one garden, the third in another.  It was my first year growing garlic and didn't realize how long they needed to stay in the ground and in late spring I had to transplant the two varieties into the other garden with the third.  In the end all three varieties were randomly mixed with each other.  They were all tasty, but I had no idea which ones were which.  Transplanting garlic works by the way.  I thought it would totally kill their growth, but it didn't.
 
I planted Oct 7th this year, and I'm pretty sure that was too early.  All my Inchelium Red were 8-10 inches above the mulch mid Nov.  The Chesnok Red were just starting to poke out of the mulch by then.  All the other varieties are still nicely hidden below the mulch so far.  I had an issue with something snacking on the Inchelium leaves.  Between the snacking and a pretty hard frost my Inchelium is looking pretty sad.  I'm not sure if they will make it through to harvest.
 
turbo said:
 
I planted Oct 7th this year, and I'm pretty sure that was too early.  All my Inchelium Red[/size] were 8-10 inches above the mulch mid Nov.  The [/size]Chesnok Red were just starting to poke out of the mulch by then.  All the other varieties are still nicely hidden below the mulch so far.  I had an issue with something snacking on the Inchelium leaves.  Between the snacking and a pretty hard frost my Inchelium is looking pretty sad.  I'm not sure if they will make it through to harvest.[/size]
I planted about that early last year. I had about 6" of growth above the soil (no mulch) and had it die back to the ground level by Jan/Feb however they all rebounded quite well. Last year was also a pretty mild winter. Bulbs might have been a bit stunted im not sure as it was my first season. But they all did grow.

This year I waited till Oct 31st. And mulched with straw. Temps here were in the 50's for the last month, however we got our first snow yesterday and temps are expected to top out in the high 20's with lows in around 0, so hopefully my mulch does its job.

I think as long as you only lose growth to ground level and not below you should be ok.
Maybe smaller bulb growth.

Good luck!
 
Having never grown garlic before, I got curious when reading this thread so I planted 8 cloves from a Kroger store garlic bulb and put them in my grow room just to see what happens. A week later, I have 8 sprouts. We'll see what happens over the winter.
 
Is it a requirement that garlic dies back over the winter or is it just that most people plant it during the off season after they harvest their other plants?
 
Garlic is one of the easiest, most sturdy veggies to grow.  There is really no reason to start it inside.  Its standard to plant it 2-3 weeks before the first freeze in the fall.  They should easily stand up to the winter, unless you live in Alaska.  Then you can harvest in june/july, depending on the variety and heat.
 
I was just worried because I planted mine way early, 2 MONTHS before the first freeze.  But from reading around, looks like it'll be ok.  
 
It'll be curious what your garlic does.  I've never heard of someone starting garlic inside before.  Good luck!
 
What you got at Kroger's is probably a softneck variety. Here in Ohio, for me at least, I find that hardneck varieties grow best. I especially like the fact that hardneck garlic usually has only 6-10 LARGE cloves per head, depending on variety, much easier and faster to chop. Some of my garlic heads almost equal  the size of my fist.
 
Hardneck garlic does best where there are hard freezes, they need to go dormant, but not really. There was a book written a bunch of years ago, I forgot the title and the full name of the author, but I believe the last name was England. He documented that garlic did indeed grow when temps were below freezing.
 
I don't know where in Ohio you're located, but if you have any active farmer's markets going, go see if any are selling any hardneck garlic, it's not too late to plant.
 
neoguy said:
There was a book written a bunch of years ago, I forgot the title and the full name of the author, but I believe the last name was England. He documented that garlic did indeed grow when temps were below freezing.
 
Here is the book:
http://www.filareefarm.com/seed-garlic-for-sale/GROWING-GREAT-GARLIC.html
 
Its written by a guy who runs Filaree Farm, up here in Eastern Washington, which is where I get my seed garlic.  You might check the site and see if they have any hardneck garlic seed left in stock.
 
Jeff H said:
Having never grown garlic before, I got curious when reading this thread so I planted 8 cloves from a Kroger store garlic bulb and put them in my grow room just to see what happens. A week later, I have 8 sprouts. We'll see what happens over the winter.
 
Is it a requirement that garlic dies back over the winter or is it just that most people plant it during the off season after they harvest their other plants?
Ohio should be a good place to grow. One of the places I order from is in Wisconsin. Garlic does best with a cold winter. Next year around late August or September start looking for some gourmet varieties. They blow away that stuff from the grocery store.

Ordered some of my stuff from http://www.wegrowgarlic.com this year and was very happy with their service and product.

Edit: Added more info.
 
Ive always used territorial seed co. they are great.
 
YOU MUST ORDER DURING THE SUMMER! They will take your order then charge and ship when ready, about mid september.
 
SELLS OUT FAST PEOPLE!
 
Garlic Update:
I've got leaves from 4" to 12" from every clove I planted.  Not one of my cloves failed to grow! 
 
Last fall, after planting the seed garlic, I mulched the garlic with 4 loose inches of cut grass and another 4 inches of loose mulched up leaves.  About a month ago, I noticed that after all the rain from the winter (Seattle) the mulch has compacted down to about 3" of plant matter.  I also noticed that some of the plants were having troubles pushing through the mulch, so I had to dig some of the sprouts out from under the mulch.  Luckly garlic leaves are very thick and strong when they start growing so there was no harm done to them. 
 
Today, on a whim, I dug through the mulch a bit and noticed that I've got a crazy amount of worms going to town on the mulch.  I was a bit surprised to find worms hanging out at ground level since its mid winter here, but it is Seattle so we rarely get below freezing.  In the late spring I'm going to pull the mulch off the garlic so the ground can warm up.  That mulch should do wonders in my compost pile!
 
Garlic is one of the easiest vegetable to grow. It requires very little maintenance. Garlic has very little disease or pest problems.
Seed Savers Exchange is another good source for garlic. 
 
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