Preparing Garlic for Seed - Creative Homesteading

Regardless of the variety you are planting, when you harvest your garlic for the year, select the biggest bulbs for replanting. Each one of those sections in the bulb will become a new head of garlic next year. Set aside the very small cloves to eat soon, to make into pickles, to dry.

If you are just starting out, purchase the biggest bulbs of garlic you can find. Each clove inside the bulb will yield one bulb of garlic.

Do not leave your garlic in the ground to come back the following year. Yes, you must DIG THEM UP, if you want them to grow properly. If you leave the whole bulb in the ground, every one of those cloves in each bulb will try to send up its own leaves and they will all try to grow in the same spot, and you will end up with a bunch of small garlic bulbs next harvest.

Garlic will simply stop developing when crowded by other garlic bulbs, weeds or heavy soil and the majority of it's growth will occur above ground, where you don't want it.

In order to protect your investment of time and money, it is necessary to pull the bulb out of the ground when it matures and store it in a cool, dry place until the fall when you will replant.

In the fall, separate the bulbs into the cloves, being careful not to bruise or damage the cloves. Plant the cloves, top side up, four to eight inches apart so they will have room to grow and develop, root side down, point up.

Shortly before planting break the bulbs apart into cloves. The cloves are attached to the root plate, the hard plate that the roots grow from.

If you separate the garlic cloves as close to planting time as possible, preferably within 24 hours, the root nodules won’t dry out and the garlic will be able to set roots more quickly.

Silverskin - This type of garlic is the one you see in the grocery stores. As the name states, the skins are silvery-white and the taste is mild & garlicky. Silverskin is a a soft-neck garlic, garlic, stores well and is the kind you use to make garlic braids.. Silverskin garlic doesn't send up a flower when planted.

Rocambole - Known as a hard-neck variety, this type of garlic will form flower heads which need to be cut off so they do not drain the resources of the bulb. Most rocambole-types have a very pungent, almost hot flavour and are often identified by the purplish tinge to their skin. Although this is a much more gourmet garlic, it does not store well, usually just a couple of months.

Elephant - The cloves of this garlic can weigh an ounce and will give you about 3 tablespoons of chopped garlic per bulb. Actually a member of the leek family Elephant Garlic has a mild garlic flavor. This is a good variety to grow if your growing environment is cool & damp, this is the garlic to choose.