Garlic Growing Guide
Garlic is the easiest and lowest-maintenance crop you can grow in your garden. It barely takes up much space and can be planted in a patio container, pot, or garden bed. Garlic is a superfood that adds flavor to many recipes and is known for its health properties and amazing taste.
Want to know how to grow this wonderful vegetable in your garden? Growing Garlic is surprisingly easy. With just a few easy steps, you can enjoy healthy, homegrown Garlic and strong harvests within a few months. In this growing guide, you'll learn about planting, growing, feeding, and harvesting Garlic in your garden.
About Garlic
Garlic (Allium sativum) belongs to the Allium genus, which includes onions, chives, shallots, and ornamental Alliums. Growing garlic in the home garden is very popular because of its culinary and medicinal properties. It is the base of countless delicious dishes used daily in kitchens worldwide. Garlic produces bulbs, which separate into multiple cloves. Each clove has a papery white-purplish or pinkish covering.
Garlic can be used in everything from salads and pasta to seafood dishes. It also goes well with chicken, lamb, prawns, and olives. Additionally, garlic heads can last a long time if properly stored and can be enjoyed in meals for months. It is an excellent crop to have in your garden all year round.
Before learning how to plant and harvest garlic, you should know which garlic variety matches your climate and will perform best in your vegetable garden.
Types of Garlic
There are two main categories of Garlic: softneck and hardneck. They are named because of their stalks.
Softneck Garlic
Softneck garlic varieties don't form hard flowering stalks like hardneck types. Their tops remain soft and supple. These types of garlic produce more tightly packed cloves (up to 18). They have papery white skin and rarely bolt.
Softneck varieties can be stored for a longer period. They are the best choice for growing in mild climates, but they are less resilient to prolonged cold temperatures.
Common softneck garlic types include:
- Artichoke
- Silverskin
- Middle Eastern
Hardneck Garlic
Hardneck garlic varieties produce a curling flower stalk called a scape. Flowers on scapes abort and form small clove-like bulbils. You can remove the scape (use it in many recipes) just when it appears so the plant produces a larger bulb. These types of garlic have fewer cloves per bulb, up to 12. Hardneck garlic has a stronger flavor and is harder than softneck garlic. They are a good choice for cold climates. However, they have a shorter storage life, usually three months after the harvest.
Common hardneck garlic types include:
- Rocambole
- Sprint
- Porcelain
- Purple Stripe
- Glazed Purple Stripe
Elephant Garlic
In addition to the above categories, well-known elephant garlic is a different species. Elephant garlic (Allium ampeloprasum) is closely related to leeks and pearl onions. This Garlic bears large, mild-flavored bulbs, best for a lighter garlic taste.
Elephant garlic can be grown successfully in either the North or South. However, it needs a long and warm growing season to yield a good crop. Sometimes, the cloves of this garlic type do not divide; instead, they produce a larger single-clove bulb. Early planting lowers the formation of these solo bulbs.
Soil Needs and Spacing
The better the soil quality, the better your garlic plants will grow. Solid plant nutrition is essential for abundant harvests. Garlic grows best in fertile, loose, well-drained, and moist soil with a pH between 6 and 7.
Add a generous amount of organic matter, such as compost or well-rotted manure, to prepare the soil 1-2 weeks before planting. Avoid using fresh manure, which contains harmful bacteria that can cause weed problems. Work on your garden soil to provide a loose bed for bulb growth. Garlic requires a moderate to high amount of nitrogen, so add some Urea before planting. If your garden has heavy and poor soil, you can grow Garlic in mulched raised garden beds.
Spacing
Plant the garlic cloves 6 inches or 15-20 cm apart in rows and 1 inch (2.5 cm) deep below the surface. The corms can grow as large as a leek and require enough space to grow. Space rows 1ft (30 cm) apart.
Growing Garlic
Grow garlic in well-drained soil that does not get soggy in winter and in a sunny spot that receives 6-8 hours of sunlight daily. Prepare the garden soil a few weeks before planting by removing weeds and mixing organic matter.
Buy good quality bulbs from a reputable garden center or seed supplier. Bulbs purchased from supermarkets are not recommended. Split the bulbs into individual cloves and plant the large cloves. Harvest once the top dies back, and let the bulbs dry out before storing.
When to plant Garlic
Garlic is commonly planted in fall or early winter (from late September to November) because it needs the cold. Most garlic varieties need one or two months at 32–50°F for healthy bulb development. However, if your garden has heavy soil, you may have more success and good yields from planting in early spring. Some garlic varieties grow well in early spring. If you live in mild climates or the south, you can plant Garlic in February or March. When planting in spring, wait until the soil can be worked. You can plant Garlic directly in the ground or start it in small pots, raised beds, or containers.
How to Plant Garlic
Growing garlic from cloves rather than seeds is much easier and more beneficial. Once you have prepared a planting site, separate your garlic bulbs into cloves. Plant the clove with the pointed end upwards and the flat, thick end downwards. Plant cloves six inches apart, with the tip 1-2 inches below the soil surface. Deeper planting can produce large, juicy bulbs in light soil. However, do not plant too deeply in heavy soil.
Cover the garden beds with straw or leaf mulch to control weeds and prevent temperature changes in winter and early spring. This will also prevent birds from pulling out newly planted cloves.
Life Cycle of the plant
Regardless of which garlic variety you grow, the lifecycle or growing pattern is the same. Here are the stages in the lifecycle of the garlic plant.
Stage 1: Germination
Spread the seeds or cloves in spring or fall. This stage lasts 1 to 2 months after sowing. When the seed germinates, the small leaves pop up from the soil.
Stage 2: Spring Sprouts
In the spring garlic stage, the Garlic shows long green leaves. You can harvest spring garlic for a tender garlic taste. At this stage, the bulbs have not matured yet.
Stage 3: Garlic Scapes
Scapes appear 3-4 weeks after the spring garlic stage. Scapes are twisty stalks with a pointed bud growing from the plant. This stage shows that the garlic will be ready to harvest in around a month.
Stage 4: Young Bulbs
After eight months, the garlic plant starts to form bulbs. Bulbs at this stage are not fully matured, but you can use them in meals to savor their crisp, juicy flavors.
Stage 5: Mature Bulbs
After nine months, the bulbs are fully grown and large, ready to harvest.
Stage 6: Harvest
When the leaves start turning yellow or brown and crispy, harvest your garlic. Your plant has reached its final stage.
Garlic Fertilization Needs and Type of Fertilizers
Garlic is a heavy feeder crop. However, you should not add fertilizer when planting because it can encourage rapid growth that will be damaged by the arrival of winter. It is always ideal to determine the nutrient makeup of your garden soil before fertilizing. Test your soil to get this information and find out which nutrients your soil may lack. If the soil has a high percentage of phosphorus, you must use low-phosphorus fertilizer (25-3-12) or no-phosphorus fertilizer (30-0-10).
In early spring, side-dress the plants with nitrogen-based fertilizer like composted chicken manure, blood meal, soybean meal, or another nitrogen source. You can also use an organic fertilizer mix mainly made for Garlic. Gently till the fertilizer into the soil surface so that the soil bacteria can begin to make nutrients available to your garlic plants. Fertilize again before the bulbs swell in response to longer days, usually in early May.
Garlic Water Needs and Irrigation System
Proper watering will develop healthy garlic plants. Water deeply at least half to one inch per week during the growing season. Deep and infrequent watering is better than watering a little daily. Garlic needs to be well-irrigated during dry spells in April through June. During the bulbing stage, water every 3 to 5 days. Stop watering a week or two before harvest to avoid staining bulbs and promoting diseases.
Avoid overhead watering to prevent fungal problems and achieve optimal bulb formation. Also, don't overwater or underwater plants, which can cause plant stress.
Best Irrigation System for Garlic Crops
Garlic requires little water and is prone to waterlogging, so effective irrigation solutions are essential. The best method to irrigate garlic plants is micro-irrigation or drip irrigation.
Use Drip Tape or 1/2" Emitter Tubing to provide the water your Garlic needs. This watering system is preferred because it allows growers to control the water in the soil compared to furrow irrigation. It delivers water directly to the plant's base through a dripline, preventing runoff. This method also reduces the risk of disease spread and can increase the yield in quality and quantity. The high-quality yield is produced because the soil remains moist but does not get soggy.
Harvesting and Storing Garlic
On average, most garlic varieties take nine months to mature from seed. However, some short-season varieties take less time. Harvest fall plantings between late June and August. If you planted garlic in spring, determine your harvest date based on the days to maturity of the garlic type you planted. Harvesting Garlic too early will result in small and thin bulbs. If you harvest too late, the bulbs can split apart, and cloves will pop out.
In general, start harvesting when the lower leaves turn brown. Harvest when the tops begin to yellow and fall. Moreover, check a few bulbs to see if the crop is ready to harvest before pulling out the entire crop. Cut the bulbs in half, and if the skin covering the bulbs is thick, papery, and dry, then your garlic is ready to harvest.
Do not pull the bulbs by leaves; dig them up with a garden fork. Pick the plants with bulbs and shoots attached. Remove any surplus soil. Put the plants in a dry and warm place for a few weeks to cure. This will dry the coverings of bulbs, shoots, and roots. Drying takes three to four weeks, depending on the climate. After curing, cut the roots close to the bulb base and cut the shoots one inch above the bulbs. Then, plait and store in a cool and dry place. You can keep some good garlic cloves for next year's crop.
Usage: You can crush, chop, slice, or roast whole cloves to add spicy flavor to various dishes. Hardneck garlic varieties have more flavor than softnecks, so they work well when roasted.
Common Diseases and Care
Garlic is a natural pest repellent, and it has few problems with pests and diseases that attack other vegetables. However, it could still be affected by similar pests and diseases that bother onions and leeks. Here are the issues that could occur.
Onion Maggots are insects that feed on plant stems or roots, spread bacteria, and cause the plants to turn yellow or stunted growth. To prevent this problem, use row covers, practice crop rotation, and harvest crops in a timely manner.
Aster Leafhoppers feed on the garlic plants, infecting them with Aster Yellows disease.
Aster Yellows disease causes discolored and foul-smelling bulbs and premature dieback of garlic leaves.
Onion White Rot is a fungal disease that causes leaves to yellow and wilt. It is hard to spot until it's too late, usually around harvest time. To prevent this problem, choose disease-free cloves, disinfect gardening tools, and practice a five-year rotation.
The Bottom Line
Growing Garlic is easy and rewarding and can be an excellent addition to countless recipes. We hope this growing guide helps you plant Garlic, enjoy abundant harvests, and savor the freshest bulbs.
Grow this wonderful vegetable in your garden to add flavor to your meals and enjoy numerous health benefits!