I planted one raised bed of garlic last fall, half soft neck and half stiff neck. (With a four foot row of Gilia down the middle which, I fear, is never going to bloom this season.)
This is the soft neck side of the bed. Pitiful, isn't it? Very few of the plants near the end of the bed showed their little green heads this spring. I still had some nice looking cloves from last year so I stuck them in the bare spots. Most of them came up, but none ever grew much over 6" tall. Sigh.
The sprout-a-bility of the stiff neck (other end of the bed) was great but almost immediately the leaves started turning yellow and even the higher, "healthier" leaves are an insipid shade of gray/green. See, Susan? I told you yours look good compared to mine. At least your self-proclaimed sad, sad garlic has some nice green color to it. Mine? Bah.
I wonder if this was just "one of those years" for garlic. I tried 2 varieties this year (I haven't bought garlic EVER--just used farm market leftovers 7 years ago and kept some to replant yearly) and it was a disaster. Same thing as you---they grew, but turned yellow early, not much size. I'm really disappointed....especially since I PAID for these. I'm NOT glad yours was the same thing, but at least it let me know those fancy pants garlic varieties weren't completely at fault.
ReplyDelete(I still wish I had kept growing my "old" kind--it did well, I just wanted to try something different. Sigh)
Sue - Mine were planted from "good" (expensive) garlic I ordered year before last. That first year did really good, nice big bulbs and stored well so I thought they would be good "keepers". Maybe your theory is right and this just wasn't a good garlic year. I don't think mine have fully matured yet, but I'm not going to let them go much longer because they look so unhealthy. Plus, that means I'll have to start over this fall with some garlic that has more vim and vigor. Better budget for that expenditure!
DeleteVery little of my Spanish Roja garlic even survived the severe winter. Maybe 4 or 5 plants. And only 3 of those survived our spring, browned out very early and was tiny. I did plant two Elephant garlic and those look beautiful. Just about time to go ahead and harvest them.
ReplyDeleteHi, SmartAlex - Susan of e-i-e-i-omg! is in your same state. Sue is in Michigan and I'm in Minnesota. Hmmmm, seems our garlic dilemma is a bit widespread. It will be interesting to see how all of ours store. I'm guessing . . . not very well. Sigh.
DeleteIt must be another bad year for garlic. I pulled mine and tied them all up to dry. I just checked it yesterday, and some were rotting vs. drying. Such a sad garden this year. I'm having to buy many things to stock up this winter.
ReplyDeleteKristina - It's totally understandable why any of your "root" crops couldn't make it this year. They must have been trying to grow in water!! I hope you can find lots of "good stuff" to buy and stock up on.
DeleteMy garlic crop (east central Wisconsin) was my best ever. We had plenty of rain, but also before I planted last fall I dug 50 pounds of worm castings into the soil. That's 6 square feet of garden heaven now.
ReplyDeleteJoy - Yay! Yours is one story of a good garlic crop. The rest of us may be visiting you this winter begging for a bulb!
DeleteMama Pea, Your garlic doesn't look too bad. But who am I to say, I don't grow garlic. You have a green thumb when it comes to planting up everything. I need your green thumbs down here, lol......
ReplyDeleteHugs,
Sandy
Aw, Sandy, you're so encouraging! As soon as I work up enough gumption, I'm going to pull some of each of the garlic and we'll see if they're worth curing and keeping!
DeleteI'm in central Kentucky and my garlic crop failed. Must be a bad year for garlic across the nation.
ReplyDeleteRue
Rue - Oh, no! Another state with garlic fail heard from! :o(
DeleteIt must be the lighting, but yours still looks better than mine... :) I'm going to yank mine out this weekend, as I don't want to lose it. It will be a bit tricky finding a cool place to hang it, though.
ReplyDeleteSusan - No, YOURS looks better than mine! (Do we sound like five year olds?)
DeleteI was wondering where I'm going to hang mine, too. Let me know where you put yours to cure and maybe I can find a comparable spot. (Always a problem, isn't it?)