The Message Board

RE: garlic

Posted 798 days ago

this should set you straight

Easy to grow. Sow Cloves. Sow seed at a depth approximately three times the diameter of the seed.
Best planted at soil temperatures between 10°C and 35°C.

Garlic is traditionally planted in cold weather and harvest in summer ("plant on the shortest day, harvest on the longest"). Plant the cloves, point upwards, deep enough to just cover with soil. A fairly tough and easy-growing plant. On better soil with regular watering you will get a better crop. On poorer soil, and forgetting to water them, you will still get some garlic, only not quite so much.

Leave a garlic to go to seed, and you will probably get plenty of self-sown plants the following year.

To keep for later use, dig up and leave to dry out for a day or so after the green shoots die down. To use immediately, pull up a clove when you need it, or cut and use the green shoots.
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No gardener is really good before he has killed one or two plants.

RE: garlic

Posted 796 days ago

Thank you for this advice on growing garlic - I've harvested mine but was very disappointed with the size of the bulbs and wondered if I should have prepared the soil better and watered them more - and the answer is probably yes. They also got scratched over by my chooks in October and were planted near a walnut which might have inhibited their growth too. All in all, you must be right - garlic is pretty tough and I still got a fair harvest and it tastes good.
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Terry