Garlic Lovers #2 Harvest timing and curing and eating!

We came from here
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1278258/

Well, we have planted and waited and fertilized and waited and watered, and waited and cut scapes and flower stalks and are still waiting!

Just WHEN is the time to harvest? What are the signs to look for? How will this year's weather affect our bulbs?

And what do we do after the harvest to 'cure' the bulbs properly?

Will any of us have enough of a crop to at least supple some cloves to plant in late fall? Or, will we be looking for 'souces of seed garlic' for next year or to expand our collection?

Reserved for useful links

http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/p.php?pid=9262399



The Many Uses of Garlic - http://perrysperennials.info/articles/garlicben.html

Elephant Garlic - http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/allium/msg0620360429...

Nichols - [HYPERLINK@www.nicholsgardennursery.com]

http://www.territorialseed.com/product/11136

On-line garlic farmers market
http://www.gourmetgarlicgardens.com/growers.html

vermont http://www.greenmountaingarlic.com/shop/garlic/

http://2sistersgarlic.com/varieties.htm

local harvest http://www.localharvest.org/store/M19189
http://lists.ibiblio.org/pipermail/market-farming/2009-July/...

http://fxcuisine.com/Default.asp?Display=151

http://www.thedailygreen.com/green-homes/blogs/organic-garde...

http://www.recipe.com/blogs/cooking/garlic-recipes-ten-thing...

This message was edited Jun 10, 2013 10:58 PM

Gita found this article by Dave of Daves Garden and it nicely 'illustrates ' what we should look for as signs our garlic is ready to harvest. Thanks Gita!

http://allthingsplants.com/ideas/view/dave/1307/When-Is-the-Right-Time-To-Harvest-Garlic/

I wrote several articles for DG on garlic. Perhaps you'll find a few helpful tidbits among them...

Creole Garlics
http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/1032/

Plant Garlic and Shallots!
http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/1765/

Softneck Garlic for Southern Climates
http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/1031/

Hardneck Garlic for Northern Climates
http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/1030/

Why Grow Garlic?
http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/1029/

Why would anyone grow A Stinking Rose? For Garlic of Course!
http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/613/

thanks for the new thread, links, and for your links and articles, Darius. I have to read up.

Sally, Garlic man has started harvesting his China White and has been cutting scapes from Music and Chesnok. He is a bit concerned about all of the rain we've had so near harvest.

I dug my small row of (presumably ) China White- they were small and all the tops had rotted off.

Sally. is that the variety that kept so well for you?

Why do you think the tops rotted? Was that row mulched?

Garlic Man says he has an advantage in determining when to harvest since he can pull a bulb of his 12 varieties every day and not make much of a dent!. He has sold about 5 bushels of scapes so far at the
Farmers Market, so interest is increasing.

Darius, do you have any harvesting tips to share?

The first year I grew garlic here, about half the tops rotted. I think it was poor drainage, and I've done lots of amending all over the garden area since then.

I usually harvest when the tops start to yellow and fall over. Same for my shallots, and the cipollini onions I'm trying this year.

Pickled garlic scapes are delightful. I lacto-ferment them but they are tasty even pickled in apple cider vinegar.

The "china white' that i grew last year did very well, I did NOT know to save the best for planting. THe bed was amended with leaves , and raised. I think this unseasonal excess rain is the culprit.
I'm going to try and save the very best of whichever varieties, HOPE i can keep it IDed...rotate to a new location this fall.

"I usually harvest when the tops start to yellow and fall over. Same for my shallots, and the cipollini onions I'm trying this year."
Is what I did with garlic last year, worked great, and thx will watch my shallots; they are still green.

We just returned from a week at disney, and my garlic looks good! Scapes are probably further along than they should have gone, but no blooms yet, so I'll chop them off today.

Darius -- what is lacto-fermenting?

I didn't realize until just now that I should be cutting the scapes (I know, I know, I was told; it just didn't sink in). I've got to do that as soon as the rain stops.

Hap... remember the old-fashioned sauerkraut and dill pickles made in crocks? Just add salt, and it ferments because lactobacillus in in the air everywhere. There is enough lactobacillus on our arms to make a loaf of sourdough bread.

The advantage of lacto-fermenting is that it actually ADDS nutrition to the food as a by-product of the bacterial action. Lacto-fermented foods also aid digestion.

Yes indeed. I had incorrectly inferred that because of the prefix "lacto", some milk product was involved. I have a pot of sourdough starter in the fridge.... and I do love sauerkraut....

I have harvested all of mine and it is 'curing' on screens and in wire mesh baskets.

Out of all I planted I'd say I have only about six acceptable size bulbs. Most are only double the original size of clove I planted.

Even though small and planted in 'potting soil' in containers, it took much more sweat equity to harvest them than I expected. (They are in there like trees!)

Darius, any suggestions of what to do with 'underseveloped' or small bulbs?

My Elephants had a number of those bulb off sets that if replanted will form a bulb the following year.

Not sure I will be around enough this summer to secure planting stock from Garlic Man for all of us. Maybe Sall will or maybe we could group order from an on line source?

When did you plant them? With the small bulbs, save them and break into cloves in the fall to re-plant. Some years I've had small bulbs in my clay soil, but as it's been amended, they do better. I've never tried growing them in pots.

All my Garlic and Shallots area is laying flat--I have not dug anything up.
Too much rain all the time...Will do so and see what grew.

This was my first and last attempt at this venture. NOT worth the space it took up.
I could plant a Tomato or something else there. Good light....

Same for my small patch of Strawberries next to the garlic. A wasted 3' x 3' area of a bed.

I think for those of you that have more area to play with--it may be more worthwhile.

BUT--at least I tried it out. G.

--Garlic bed--Dill on edge
--Strawberry patch
--Two tomatoes growing in same bed--Sun Golds and Mortgage Lifter. Doing OK!
AM sun until 3PM.

They were planted in early Nov.

My question about replanting them this fall is don't small cloves generally produce small bulbs? I'm talking many thumb sized bulbs!

Judy

Judy, not necessarily. Depends a lot on whether they like where they are planted. I side dress my onions, shallots and garlic with Greensand.

My garlic is all smaller than last year and nothing to write home about. I blame the weather as I grew great garlic the year before. I still have them separated by name so will be trying to save the biggest.
I might just sit with all the little bulbs, peel the cloves and freeze them.

Mine doesn't look ready to harvest yet, but maybe that is because I didn't remove the scapes.

Well--I consider this an experiment i will never repeat...
It is just not worth the results I got. Also--it is not worth the space all this
took up as I could have planted 2-3 tomatoes in it...

Judy--sorry to say all this---I know you are A GREAT go-getter for doing
things--but I use garlic seldom--as I cook seldom.

The heat, probably, did not help. When I went to dig up to see if anything
was there at all--all the foliage was dry and flat on the ground...

I got 3 Elephant garlic cloves (NOT so big!) and maybe 6 small garlic cloves.
Smaller than the ones you get in the multi-netting tube.

All my Shallots were the size of a small, slim garlic clove...

They are all still hanging outside under my patio roof.
I think I should bring them in and decide what to do....

Here they all are:
1--regular garrlics
2--Elephant garlic (3 heads)
3--This is all the shallots.....HUH? Not even worth trying to peel them...

Gita, That's really pitiful on the shallots!

This is the first year (in several years) that I haven't planted shallots bur even in the beginning here with raw red clay they were decent sized... not large mind you but acceptable. Side dressing with greensand helps.

I'm gonna blame the weather as I had such good results last year. My elephant garlic each made a couple walnut sized cloves.
I saved the nest two heads of Oregon Blue and Chesnok to replant.
I took a bunch of heads of the other garlic, peeld them all, cut off the root tip and had them in a bowl- DS said "Ohh , pine nuts? " HAHA thats how small they were. I threw a bunch of them in slow cooker stew tonight.

I've only pulled 3 so far, and they were OK, maybe a little smaller than grocery store heads. But they didn't have much "paper" around the head, just one or two layers, so I don't think I can keep them dry/dark. I'm going to try to get the rest out this week, peel them all, and maybe pickle them (probably just in the fridge, not canning).

They were, however, extremely tasty! Much hotter when raw, wonderfully sweet when cooked. I'll try this again. :-)

Garlic Man says this season was worst he has had...too much rain at wrong time. Same stroy when I talked to seveeral garlic growers up in Vermont last week. So, I guess I don't feel too bad!

Mine are all nice and dry . I figure volume wise I have tripled what I planted. A bit dismayed at the prospect of peeling lots of little cloves until I found this "How to peel an entire head of garlic in 10 seconds"
http://www.thekitchn.com/smart-tip-peel-an-entire-head-157145

Any of you ordering garlic this year for planting this fall?

Anyone want me to pick up some heads from Garlic Man? Either for Sally's swap or Jill's Bulb Sort Day?

Coleup, can you please get me some? I did garlic for the first time last fall and have been able to enjoy several (tiny) cloves in the last few weeks. I had just planted the ones from the grocery store, but I'm hooked now and want to do lots more this year.

Anyway, I'm late to your garlic party but I want in for this fall. Please let me know the details on the Garlic Man, if it's in time for Sally's as I won't be attending the bulb swap.

Thanks!

well thats sure worth a try! thanks!! I'm going to try my teeny cloves in a large jar though.

I had fine results the first year with store bought garlic so I'm just going back to that.

Yea Karen! I thought it was you who mentioned garlic!!

Last year at the Fall Swap at Sally's, we had a garlic 'tasting' of about seven varieties of roasted garlic. It was a fun part of a fun day. If you look at the thread this one is a continuation of you can see the 'details'' on what is available from Garlic Man and what varieties I can bring from him. He also had Georgian Fire for sale today. That's the hottest one.

The advantage to getting from Garlic Man is that the garlic is more acclimated to our growing conditions (not the best for garlic) than NE or NW . The disadvantage is that this year's crop is not as good as last years.

I'm going to plant as many of my hardnecks as I can because I have discovered how wonderful the scapes are for Spring eating. Even small cloves will send up a flower scape!

So let the garlic games begin!

I'll post something over on our swap discussion thread too.

Coleup, I'd love to get 4 heads of Georgian Fire and 1 of 'Music' the next time you see Garlic Man, please! (We'll eat some of the 'Fire' at TGiving)

Coleup, are you coming to Sally's? I think I missed that part.

I'd love 2 Music! I completely missed out last year.

Yes, It looks like I will be in town for Sally's swap!

Got you and Jill down for garlic over on our Haves and Wants thread.

Judy,

Can you put me down for 5- Georgian Fires?

Coleup, I think you guys liked Music best in your tastings, right? I'll take 2 of them plus 1 of the German one and 1 Red one. So I will owe you $4 at the swap. Thanks!

I raised all of my garlic within the last week. It is drying on a side porch. We have lots of garlic but absolutely none worthy of photographing and bragging on. this has been one of my worst garlic years. This year's crop is half the size of last year's crop. This year the soup kitchen will get our excess. They are thankful for anything that comes in for their use.

I had saved for replanting the best two heads of Chesnok and best one of Oregon Blue. Neither was even half as big as a commercial head of garlic. But I took ten cloves each and planted them today. I'm really NOT feeling near the enthusiasm of last year! I then stuck another dozen plus tiny cloves around the spinach bed to try and discourage voles.

My parents' garlic plants seem to rot even though they have well draining soil. Anything they could do to prevent it?

what about planting in a raised row? let's see if I can describe what I mean... ordinarily, you'd hoe a row a few inches deep, plant the cloves, and cover them up to the level of the surrounding soil. If instead you hoe up 2 close rows and put all the dirt between them, you'll have a raised line of hoed-up soil, maybe 6 inches wide. Stick the garlic cloves in that raised band of soil, and for sure they'll get enough drainage.

Other than that... don't peel the cloves (you'd be surprised; people do), and maybe stick them at an angle so water isn't collecting where the sprouting leaves meet the bulb.

SS, if your parents are anywhere on the East Coast and you are referring to this passed year....it was a lousy season for most garlic growers both experienced/commercial and casual backyard.
no matter when, where or how planted. Most varieties did poorly compared to the previous year or average year.

This spring was just too wet/cold, wet/hot, wet/cold, for garlic from here on up thru New England.

Garlic is not a beginner crop...takes quite a bit of finesse!

I'm planting lots of my baby cloves anywhere I can fit them in. I figure I'll at least get some scapes out of them! Surprisingly most of my own harvest has kept pretty well. Soil is so dry that I may water them in a bit. And feeding them should help. too.

Happy repelling Sally.

Even docgipe said it was the worst garlic weather he's ever seen. If HE has a bad crop you know its really bad.

I found my gallon ziploc of all the other tiny garlic cloves and miniature shallot divisions that I dug in June…I am going to try and repel a lot!