Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: Ian_P on July 02, 2007, 10:06
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My garlic is tiny!
Last year I managed to get 4-5cms bulbs, all with multiple cloves.
This year most are 1-2 cms and some have only one bulb.
The only difference, apart from the weather, was the depth I planted them.
Last year I had no instructions on the packet so I planted like shallots, with the neck just at the surface. This year with a different brand, the packet clearly says (and I still have it) plant 3" below the surface. Even I thought this was a lot so I compromised and planted the bottom of the bulb 3" below the surface.
They never showed up at the top and when I dug them up they were rubbish.
Did I suffocate them?
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From what I've read, garlic doesn't like the wet! Is it wet where you are? In last 2-month period, we have had >250% of average rainfall.
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When did you plant Ian?
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My garlic has done okay this year. I had to dig it all up over the weekend as the tops were starting to look ropey and mushy and those tiny black slugs that you get were starting to look rather too interested for my liking - what with that and the rust I considered I was in danger of losing the plants altogether.
I've set it out to dry on a wire rack in the garage, and hopefully we get a blast of hot dry sunny weather soon to dry it all properly (...staring into the distance wistfully...).
I always plant my garlic nice and deep in the autumn, probably even deeper than you Ian, and mulch the bed with compost. Not sure what went wrong with yours - could have been time of year you planted - they need as long a period of cold as poss to set the individual cloves and we had quite a warm winter which may have stopped them developing properly. Better luck for next year's harvest.
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Mine will go in at the end of October, I give the bed a good dressing of bonemeal then plant a few weeks later, I normally moan about our dodo sandy soil but for once I find it great as it never gets really wet like the clay soils and the garlic always do well.