When whould I harvest my garlic?

PunkRotten · Mon Jun 04, 2012 3:28 am

I planted some garlic last year around mid October. I have done nothing special except watered them one time with liquid fish fertilizer. The soil is pretty good to begin with though. But anyway I was thinking it is getting close to harvest time but I forgot the things I should be doing. I remember reading about not watering them for a few weeks. Anything else I should be doing? And when should I pull them?

SOB · Mon Jun 04, 2012 8:46 am

I know you are supposed to slow down on the watering but I don't think you should completely stop. As for harvesting - wait until most the leaves turn brown and then pull them out, dry them completely and store them.

soil · Mon Jun 04, 2012 9:32 am

Do some research on curing garlic there are some good websites out there. Curing them right could mean 3 months storage or 18 month.

rainbowgardener · Mon Jun 04, 2012 10:09 am

I pulled one of my Oct planted garlic yesterday, just to see. It had a scape that was well curled, but leaves were still green. It had a bulb size that I would be proud of if it were an onion (I actually had to look twice to see if I had accidentally pulled an onion instead), but had not divided itself up into cloves yet.

This was NOT elephant garlic and I have no idea why it got so big.

PunkRotten · Mon Jun 04, 2012 7:51 pm

Yeah I got one plant of Elephant Garlic. I pulled one of the Garlic plants today (the runt). And it actually has a nice average size bulb. The other plants have a base about double or triple the size of this one. So I am thinking their bulbs are even bigger. I am gonna wait till July to pull those ones though. I put the pulled garlic in the garage to cure where it is cool and dark mostly, is that ideal? I read 4-6 weeks is the wait time, is that right?

orgoveg · Tue Jun 05, 2012 12:48 am

I guess the general rule of thumb is to pull them when you see alot of yellow leaves. I can't remember if you want 1/3 or 2/3 yellow but I just pull them when I see "alot of yellow".

As for curing, shoot, all I do is lay them in the sun for a few days. I roll them over daily and bring them in at night (and when it rains). I'm still using garlic that I harvested last year.