garlic harvest problem

[DMK]

My garlik is the hard stem type I think. I harvest it in late summer and replant either the starters from the stem tops or indevidual cloves a couple weeks later. The past couple years the paper holding the heads togeather has been thin and weak. Causing the heads to break apart and leaving separated cloves in the ground. Would like suggestions as to what I am doing wrong. Thanks Dan

[Marlingardener]

You may be doing nothing wrong, since some varieties of garlic have thinner "paper" than others.
It is possible you are leaving it in the ground too long. A fall planting ought to be harvestable by late spring. Try pulling one or two in early June and see what they look like.
There are some really expert garlic growers here, so you'll most likely get better advice from them!

[applestar]

Do you just pull on the stem? My soil tends to be heavy and I plant deeper since normal winter lows can get down to negative single digits. So I always use a hand fork to loosen the soil around the bulb before pulling garlic.... But we've had this discussion before and I believe there were some that dig and some that just pull around here.

Also, IME, if the garlic had gone to flower, the cloves tend to be more open and less firmly attached, as are older bulbs as Marlingardener mentioned.

I almost always miss entire bulbs here and there, and in the spring, I go around individually pulling the clustered garlic shoots and planting them around as well letting well spaced ones grow where they are. These spring (re)planted ones seem to just make one giant round clove.

[DMK]

Thanks for the info it will be helpfull. I also went to wegrowgarlic.com and they also mentioned harvesting too late will cause the heads to come apart. So I think I will be checking on them sooner this year. Again thank you for your help. Dan

[Green Mantis]

Can you grow garlic pieces, that are putting out a small green shoot? Ones that were purchased from the grocery store?
Just wondered if I put them in soil, would they grow?
Thanks.

[Marlingardener]

Yes, the individual cloves are what is planted, and if you plant in the fall, you'll have garlic heads in late spring.
If you plant them now, you may get a large single bulb in the fall, which you can replant and harvest a head with cloves in the spring.
Grocery store garlic is fine to plant, as long as you don't want a "named" variety.

[Green Mantis]

Thanks MG, I just wanted to experiment, but wasn't sure it would work. Now I''ll try for fun.

[mtgarden gal]

Marlingardener, was curious about something you said:
Yes, the individual cloves are what is planted, and if you plant in the fall, you'll have garlic heads in late spring.

"If you plant them now, you may get a large single bulb in the fall, which you can replant and harvest a head with cloves in the spring.
Grocery store garlic is fine to plant, as long as you don't want a "named" variety"

This is my first year growing garlic. I planted some last fall, which kind of heaved themselves out of the ground and are covered half by soil, half by straw mulch (so I'm not sure how they will end up) but I also planted some this spring because I had a store bought clove start sprouting in my pantry so I took it out and planted it to see how it would grow. Ok, so my question is, you said garlic planted now (spring) may grow to a large single bulb in the fall, which you can replant and harvest next spring. So if you're going to replant it, why dig it up in the first place? Can't you just leave it in the ground and let it keep growing?

[rainbowgardener]

Yes you could just leave it in the ground to keep going.

I think MG was assuming you might want to dig some of your garlic in the fall just to see what was happening. You can use the single large bulb as garlic even though it doesn't have cloves.

And I agree that I have found garlic difficult to harvest. The first time I grew it, I expected to be able to just pull it out. Not so! It seems to be very firmly rooted or the ground hardens around it or something. I end up having to do a lot of digging.

And I have a whole clump of small garlic plants growing now, where something must have gotten left behind last year.