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Sunday, September 30, 2012

Some of my garlic emerging in the fall

It is around the time to plant garlic so I ended up putting them in rows, about 10 inches apart, while their individual distance is usually about 6 inches just to ensure they get nice and big. I tilled up the soil, and made separate beds so the cloves can dig their roots into the ground further which will result in larger bulbs next summer since they can take in more nutrients.

Here's one of my beds for soft neck garlic with last year's bulbils, and new cloves that haven't emerged yet.







Here's the soft neck garlic emerging from a different bed. I have around 2000-3000 cloves of garlic planted of all species as I literally grow these guys on my bamboos, and all the available garden space I have.




Here are some of the hard neck garlic cloves from last year's bulbils. They should produce full sized bulbs next year, but I may have planted them a bit too close to reach a close size. They are planted in distinct rows so it will be easier to take out the weeds once in a while, at least until the garlic manage to dominate the soil with their roots.




They are emerging at different rates as 1 species hasn't even shown itself yet.


Some are planted in advance, just to serve as markers for where I want to plant the rest of them.




These are from bulbs that were left in the ground over winter so they ended up sprouting over the summer, and will be well developed going into winter. I don't really see a problem as damage on the foliage over winter doesn't seem to hinder them in the spring. I separated them, and planted them all over the place.

Here's how a few of them look unseparated.




This picture shows a mixture of bulbils from last year, and bulbils from this year. There is a clear difference in size. Bulbils will upsize a bit in their first fall to form a round, then they will wake up again in the spring to gain more size so they will be at the size of regular cloves within 1 year of growth as they grow twice.

4 comments:

  1. Looks like you'll be set for a bountiful garlic harvest in the near future!

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    Replies
    1. They are so easy to plant so I don't mind putting in a few thousand.

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  2. Hi Steve -
    galic looks good - i planted some Bianco Piacenza (from Burpee) a couple of weeks ago. It is now sprouting. Do I cover it for the winter w/some mulch? Zone 7 Southern MA

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    Replies
    1. A little bit of leaf mulch will help prevent bulbs from heaving up from the freeze thaw cycle.

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