the difference sunshine makes

[rainbowgardener]

I had garlic planted in the sunny front yard bed and the shadiest back yard bed. All planted from the same batch of garlic cloves saved from what I grew last year. The bulbs of the ones grown in sun are at least 50% bigger than the shady ones, even though the plants looked very similar and all looked healthy.

But the good news is you CAN grow garlic in pretty much shade!

[Northernfox]

Do you have pictures

My garlic is still growing like crazy. But it gets a ton of light

[rainbowgardener]

Sorry, not doing pictures right now, but that would have made a good one.

Your season and timing would be different from mine, being so far north. As it was I left mine in the ground longer than I might have, trying to wait for a dry day to pull them. The plants were pretty totally dead by the time I dug them up. I planted these last Oct.

[applestar]

Sounds great!
I'm trying every bed around the house to see what works. Some have worked well, others not so much.
(don't so what I did -- do NOT plant garlic where plants planted in spring will TOTALLY obscure them and make it nearly impossible to see when to harvest them, let alone get to them )

One problem I ran into is that sunny and shady at mid to late October is NOT the same as during winter, spring or summer. It re-emphasizes the importance of making note of sun positions and shade-creating solid structures vs. ephemeral tree canopies, and how they affect amount of sun in garden beds throughout the year.

[rainbowgardener]

Yes, once the leaves were starting to fall, that backyard bed was much sunnier than it is now.

[DoubleDogFarm]

Interesting, but I'm wondering about the other differences.

Shade cooler soil / Sun warmer soil
Type of soil and amendments in the two locations
Water, Sun more rain / Shade less rain
Diseases, Any Rust in either location

Eric

[rainbowgardener]

You are right that more sun and warmer soil seem to be confounded variables that would be difficult to separate out.

Otherwise I don't think there are many differences in soil, rain (the plot is shaded from sun, but not from rain), diseases (all the plants looked quite healthy).