Yourgarlic cloves were plantedlast September ( or peradventure October or November ? ) , grew steadily through wintertime and bound , and now that it ’s nearly summertime , they ’re quick to be picked from the garden , right ?
Well , maybe .
Unlike many veggie that are planted in spring and harvested in fall , garlic is ordinarily engraft in gloam and harvest from belated fountain to mid summertime . It ’s a long - maturing crop , taking eight to nine months from seeded player garlic ( plantable cloves ) to final crop .
connect : Find First and Last Frost Dates Accurately with This Custom Planting Calendar
Garlic is also one of those things where timing is everything , and the harvest period can span from May to August , calculate on the date of planting , the weather conditions , and the type of garlic grown .
It ca n’t be picked too early or too late , but since the bulbs are all belowground , how can you really tell when your garlic is ripe and ready ?
The short result is : It ’s all in the leaves .
How to know when your garlic is ready to harvest
Unlike its allium cousin , the onion , garlic matures when its parting are still partly green . Garlic bulbs remain below earth during evolution , so it ’s voiceless to have a go at it when they ’re ready to reap .
Onion pass on , on the other hired hand , begin to lose color and wilt when they stop growing . The tops dry out up and flop over , telling you it ’s clip toharvest onion . Most onion bulb have pushed themselves out of the soil and it ’s easy to see whether they ’ve fully mature .
So what ’s the magic of knowing when to harvest garlic ?
expect at how many folio are left on the plant .
Each folio above land indicates a layer of protective paper wrapped around the light bulb . A garlic plant with 10 green leaves , for example , will have 10 layers of bulb wrappers .
While there ’s no stock number of leave that Allium sativum should have , a reliable harvest time indicator is when half the leaves have died off , and half are still green . The leaves originate to perish off from the bottom up .
Just do n’t await untilallthe leaves have died back before you commence to reap . Without the bulb wrapping protecting the garlic school principal , the clove tree may separate and the Allium sativum wo n’t stash away well .
Here ’s another trick for timing the harvest of your Allium sativum : If you grow hardneck garlic , your crop will take form garlic shaft about four to six weeks before the bulb is matured . Once youharvest the scape , wait a month or so , then start checking the size of the medulla .
When to stop watering
Continue to irrigate your garlic as common in spring , even as the folio bulge out to die off .
When at least 50 to 75 percentage of your crop has reach the telltale stage of maturity — half the parting are brown and one-half are green — stop watering your garlic for one week .
This admit the soil to dry out out a bit to prevent rot , and makes harvesting easy if the soil is loose and crumbly instead of wet and compressed .
How to harvest the bulbs
First , do a pre - check ( as I like to call it ) .
Lightly dig up into the dirt around a random medulla oblongata , or a few random bulbs ( ask tutelage not to damage any of the wrappers or cloves ) , and check its size of it without digging the whole matter up .
If the electric light looks small , chuck the soil back down and wait a few more daytime before you check again . If the light bulb front substantial , the wrappers tight , and the cloves plank and well - take shape , it ’s ready to be harvested .
Carefully loosen the filth around your medulla with a trowel and gently overstretch the garlic out from the base of its prow , at its neck . Brush off any extra dirt that descend off easily .
Should you wash garlic after harvesting?
Donotwash your garlic or remove the bulb wrapper after harvest home .
Washed ail tends to collect spare moisture in the bulb that may lead to fungal infestations . It ’s also additional prison term and effort that only is n’t necessary , and I am all for efficiency in the garden !
From a cleanliness standpoint , most of the soil sticks to the outermost layer of newspaper , which is also the layer that tends to shred and flake off away during harvesting . Once this layer fall off of course , it ’ll reveal a clean layer of bulb housecoat .
Proper storage is important
If you contrive to eat your garlic justly away , use scissors to reduce the leave and ascendant so you’re able to keep them tidy in the kitchen .
Dostore the garlic at room temperature in a dark , dry place with plenitude of atmosphere circulation , such as an open newspaper bag or telegram basket in a buttery or closet .
Don’tstore ail in the refrigerator . Light and wet are its worst enemies , and Allium sativum stack away in the fridge for a long catamenia will start to get moldy or sprout .
You should expend the garlic within 3 hebdomad , or within 7 to 10 days once you snap off loose a head of Allium sativum . Any garlic that may have been cosmetically damaged during harvest ( but are still edible ) should be used first , as it ’ll decline in timbre sooner .
If you want to prepare your garlic for retentive - condition storage , keep the leaves and tooth root intact and follow this guide forcuring your garlic crop .
When do different varieties mature?
Generally , Asiatic and Turban diversity of garlic mature first in the time of year ( as early as May in some area ) , while Silverskins mature last ( in July or August ) .
There can be a six- to eight - week duad between the clock time the early Allium sativum are quick to when the latest - mature garlics are pulled from the ground . small plants often mature earlier than larger plant .
For good example , I once planted Ajo Rojo ( a Creole garlic ) and Siciliano ( an Artichoke garlic ) in October in my Southern California garden , and both were picked about two week apart in former May and former June . These spring harvests are distinctive of fond region , specially for cultivars that are well suitable to the climate .
In northern climate , harvesting from gloaming planting typically pass off in late July to August .
In southern climates , harvest depends on the actual planting day of the month .
Garlic Maturity Chart by Type
Your harvest period is also determined by the current weather and ground condition , so even if you grow the same cultivar of Allium sativum this time of year , it may not mature at the same rate as last time of year .
Since there are no hard - and - truehearted dates to go by , the best way of know when to reap garlic is to set off pay attending to the farewell in spring .
What happens if you harvest too early
Timing is important when it comes to harvesting and shelf life .
If you glean Allium sativum too before long , the bulb will be smaller and may not have fully divided into single garlic clove . The bulb wrappers will be thin and will disintegrate more easy , pass on your garlic susceptible to decompose or other damage .
If you have no choice but to harvest garlic early on ( for model , if you know you ’ll be out of townsfolk ) , you’re able to still eat on the unripened plants .
Very young garlic ( calledgreen Allium sativum ) can be stored in the refrigerator , and both the white bulb and unripe leaves can be used like light-green onions .
Garlic that ’s almost quick ( but probably pick a couple weeks too too soon ) should becured , with the savvy that it might not store as long as it typically does .
What happens if you harvest too late
While you should n’t harvest garlic too soon , you also should n’t reap too tardily .
If you leave garlic in the ground for too long , the over - ripen bulbs will split up and form shoots from each clove ( looking like a Siamese Gemini version of garlic ) . The cloves will also burst out of their protective outer skin as they separate apart , leaving them vulnerable to pestilence and diseases in the stain .
While overgrown garlic is still edible , it wo n’t last in storage and require to be used properly aside .
But let ’s say you forget or missed a few garlic bulbs in the ground during harvesting . That ’s okay !
Garlic is in reality a recurrent veggie and will extend to dissever and regrow from Eugenia aromaticum , year after year . The plants will start to become overcrowded after a couple of days , but this is a great path to keep a crop of garlic greens for enjoyment .
I actually have a repeated patch of garlic in my garden that I thin out every other year . It ’s extremely humble - maintenance as far as vegetable crops go , and gives me an eternal supply of delicious , mildly garlic - flavour stems that I use like green onions .
If you’re able to apportion a minor amount of space in your garden , I highly advocate growing garlic as a perennial !
Common questions about harvesting garlic
Should I let my garlic flower?
In spring , hardneck garlic produce rigid peak stalks ( calledgarlic scapes ) that eventually leave to flush on the ending .
While it ’s not recommended to rent them flower if you need dependable , rich bulbs , the presence of the garlic scape itself does n’t seem to slow bulb growing . A well option is to cut off the garlic scape when it lead off to loop and eat it !
Can I use garlic right out of the ground?
Yes , you could employ pertly dug garlic right away , rude or cooked . you may also eat up garlic before it ’s cure .
A dependable way to split your harvest is to set a handful of bulbs by that you’re able to exhaust within three weeks , thencure the remaining garlicso they ’ll store for several month .
When do I harvest spring garlic?
bounce garlic ( also known asgreen garlicor babe Allium sativum ) is garlic that was planted in free fall , but harvested while it ’s still immature . At this early level , the bulbs of green garlic have n’t divided yet , and the craw is picked for its tasty , scallion - like leaves .
fleeceable ail can be glean at any point in early spring while the folio are greenish and tender . While some people grow green ail as a elementary craw , others employ this technique to thin out a densely planted crop in spring .
Here’s what to do next with your garlic harvest
This post updated from an clause that originally appeared on July 9 , 2011 .
