Is it too late to plant garlic?

kdms 11/4/2012, 2:46 pm

The topic is rather self-explanatory Laughing

....all the commercial growers put their crops in around three to four weeks ago, and then Hurricane Sandy dumped weeks of rain on us, and I'm not sure if there's any point to sticking my garlic in the ground now only to have it possibly rot because the ground isn't likely to dry out enough before it starts to freeze. We got snowed on yesterday, and it's only supposed to get colder.

Any thoughts on this? I don't mind planting in early spring, but I'd rather do it now if there's any chance it won't be a waste of time. TIA.... Smile

karen

**camprn** 11/4/2012, 2:48 pm

In my humble opinion, if the ground isn't frozen it's not too late to plant garlic... Like a Star @ heaven

kdms 11/4/2012, 2:55 pm

That's the way I'm leaning as well... I was just wondering. I've not tried to grow garlic before because it's so cheap at the store, but we hit a local garlic festival as a novelty this summer and whoa! No more imported flavourless garlic for us..... Very Happy

I guess my next question is how do I jumpstart it? None of my bulbs have got the little green ends on them yet. Do I need to worry about that at all?

**camprn** 11/4/2012, 2:57 pm

kdms wrote:That's the way I'm leaning as well... I was just wondering. I've not tried to grow garlic before because it's so cheap at the store, but we hit a local garlic festival as a novelty this summer and whoa! No more imported flavourless garlic for us.....

Go ahead and prep a bed and plant the individual cloves pointy end up about 5 inches apart (10-12 cm). I just put mine in last week and I think our growing zones are the same, roughly.

kdms 11/4/2012, 2:58 pm

How deep do you plant yours?

**camprn** 11/4/2012, 3:07 pm

kdms wrote:How deep do you plant yours?

About the length of my thumb, 4-5 cm -ish. Wink

mollyhespra 11/4/2012, 4:50 pm

kdms, I only just got my garlic in last week, also. I've never grown it before, either, but I figure why not?

Camp, I made the holes about that length, but then when the cloves went in, the pointy ends/tops were closer to the surface, maybe only 1.5" beneath the MM for some of the larger cloves. I thought about top-dressing them...do you think it's worth the bother?

**camprn** 11/4/2012, 5:02 pm

They will probably be ok. the base of the clove is 2 inches below and that's ok. when the ground gets close to freezing you can mulch. In the spring around dandelion time you can top dress with compost.

kdms 11/4/2012, 5:06 pm

Planted! I threw some hay over the top just in case I don't get around to doing it later...couldn't believe how many worms I unearthed when planting.

I noticed the same thing...that the tips weren't very deep either, but I figured it was just due to the size of the cloves. Huge. Planted Rosewood and Mennonite varieties, and I've got some more I'll put in in the spring, just for comparison purposes.

**camprn** 11/4/2012, 6:02 pm

You planted the individual cloves separately and not the whole bulb, right? Some folks have been known to do that, 'cause they didn't know better. affraid

Also, take care using hay as a mulch, it is usually full of seed.

kdms 11/4/2012, 8:31 pm

Yep individual cloves Laughing

The Rosewood has got the biggest cloves I've ever seen....it was a shock the first time I broke open a bulb to use it! Shocked

**RoOsTeR** 11/4/2012, 8:38 pm

Also, take care using hay as a mulch, it is usually full of seed.

I'll never do that again Evil or Very Mad

CapeCoddess 12/28/2012, 3:21 pm

I planted about 2 dozen more garlic cloves about 10 days ago as the ground isn't frozen yet...maybe tonight.

But this post is concerning the ones I planted on Halloween. Most of them have double sprouted. By that I mean, they have 2 main stems coming up instead of one. I know I didn't put 2 cloves to a hole. Is this normal? Are they OK?

CC

bnoles 12/28/2012, 5:32 pm

Sure hope it is normal CC as I have multiple sprouts on mine also. We have not had any really freezing weather since I put mine in about the same time as you and my garlic and shallots are growing like crazy. I just hope it all works out come Spring.

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