Garlic is most often planted in the fall (between late September and November). In areas that get a hard frost, plant garlic cloves 6 to 8 weeks before the first fall frost date, before the ground freezes.
Garlic cloves are best planted between November and April, although you will generally get a bigger and better crop if you plant in the autumn. In fact, many gardeners swear by planting before Christmas to get the best results.
How long does it take garlic to grow? On average, you'll be waiting about nine months from seeds to harvest. The good news: once you get these bulbs in the ground, there's little to do but wait. Follow these easy tips to plant, grow, and harvest garlic in your home garden.
Recommended Planting Time: Separate the garlic bulb into cloves before planting. Garlic should be planted in March to early April in warmer climates (Qld and northern NSW). Planting after April will reduce the size of the bulbs. Garlic planted in March will be ready for harvest by September.
It is not mandatory that you soak garlic before planting. In fact, there are plenty of successful garlic growers that do not do this step and plant the cloves right into the ground and have a wonderful garlic crop.
Be sure and amend the soil with well rotted manure or, preferably a quality compost. If possible spread 2 to 1 inch of compost over the entire planting area and work it into the first few inches of soil. As with most garden crops, garlic grows best when the soil pH is between 6 and 7.
Scattering a couple of tablespoons of Epsom salts over each square metre of planting bed can up the strength of your garlic. This is because garlic produces its flavour compounds using the sulphur it sucks up from the soil.
Autumn (March/April) is the main planting time throughout New South Wales. This allows the garlic plant to have a fairly long vegetative period before the higher temperatures and longer days in late spring cause leaf initiation to cease and bulbing to commence.
Fertilize garlic in the early spring by side dressing or broadcasting with blood meal, pelleted chicken manure or a synthetic source of nitrogen. Just before the bulbs begin to swell in response to lengthening daylight (usually early May), fertilize lightly one more time.
Garlic is one of the easiest crops to grow, and learning how to grow garlic is simple. Even better, once you've grown it, you can regrow garlic year after year from your own bulbs.
Too little water can stress plants, and too much water can cause bulb rot. In soil with ideal drainage, garlic requires between a half-inch and one inch of water per week. If it rains less than a half-inch in a week, make up the difference with supplemental watering. It is best to water deep, but infrequently.
Sprouting garlic is a simple process: Just wrap your cloves in a damp paper towel and place them in a warm location. After about two days, your cloves should begin to sprout. 2. Place the sprouted clove in a clear container.
Planting depth makes all the difference. At a minimum, sow each clove three inches deep and then be sure to spread six inches of mulch or more. If you're not planning to mulch, sow at least five inches deep.
Like many spring flowering bulbs, garlic is planted in the fall. For best results, garlic should be planted in late September to mid-October. FALL LEAVES: How is the fall 2018 leaf peeping season shaping up? The long history of garlic goes back to the ancient Egyptians, Babylonians and Chinese.
The more time garlic has to grow before forming bulbs, the larger the heads will be. Planting garlic in the spring leaves less time for garlic to grow, so spring garlic will be smaller than its overwintered counterparts and will not have the classic cloves.
Chill garlic cloves in the fridge for a few weeks before planting. This improves bulb development. You can skip this step but it helps grow bigger garlic.
Seasol dilution with my Facultative Anaerobic Microbes and Garlic Seed Inoculum. Presoaking encourages germination, adds beneficial nutrient and protective microbe coating to your cloves. solution to spray onto planted garlic before mulch is applied.
Baking soda is considered a "significant killer" of bacterial suspensions and has been shown to significantly decrease the numbers of viable bacterial cells. This mixture provides a nutritional boost for our garlic and acts as an effective at killing bacteria and mold that might be hidden on the garlic cloves.
Fertilize, but Don't Over-Fertilize the Soil
Root growth is what we're going for here, so take it easy on the nitrogen-rich fertilizers. Instead think about tossing some eggshells, chicken feathers or other natural soil enrichment materials to your garden plot.
It thrives on potash; fresh ash from Bonfire night can be worked into the ground before planting. I feed again in mid-spring with seaweed or comfrey to top up growth, but if your soil is in reasonable health, you need to do little to please garlic.
Garlic grows best in well-drained, moisture-retentive soil with pH between 6.0 and 7.0. Plant cloves in the fall, usually one or two weeks after the first killing frost. Unless you control weeds early, they can easily overtake young garlic plants.
If you have any leftover coffee grounds, a handful on top of the clove will help it grow, as garlic likes an acidic soil pH. But, if you are not growing the garlic near a sidewalk, a foundation or in a rocky area, this shouldn't be a concern.
If you're short of nitrogen, add compost, aged manure, feather-meal, fish-meal or other high-nitrogen amendments. Incorporate them well before you plant, if possible. You can also add nitrogen later in the fall when the garlic or onion leaves are 4–6 in. high.
Spacing and Soil Fertility for Bigger Bulbs
Big bulbs need plenty of space to stretch their legs, or rather roots. For both onions and garlic this means at least 15cm (6in) between each plant and 30cm (12in) between rows. Elephant garlic needs more like 30cm (12in) between plants in each direction.