This year’s garlic plantings are complete. There are several ideas when to plant garlic. Traditionally some European countries plant garlic on the shortest day of the year for good luck. We like the lore, but here in Potter County we would be planting garlic in the ice and snow! Another source of says 4-6 weeks before the ground freezes, in order to allow good root development. Another source says after the first frost, to prevent too much development before winter. The last two ideas seem to work for us, since it translates to plant from late-September or early-October until Thanksgiving.
This fall, we planted 307 pounds with an expected yield of 1647 pounds. The breakdown by cultivar and field location is given in the tables below.
To be proactive, we pre-soaked some of our garlic seed cloves with a treatment of sodium bicarbonate, seaweed liquid fertilizer and ethyl alcohol. We soaked newly acquired planting stock along with some of our own farm-grown stock (controlled treated control group) prior to planting. If results show that the treated garlic grows as good or better than the untreated garlic cloves, then at next year’s planting we will soak our own seed stock and any new acquired planting stock.
For a few years now, we have noticed that along the side the farm road, on a bank, there is a small patch of long stemmed garlic plants growing amongst the weeds. This fall we pulled some of these garlic plants and transplanted a few dozens of the small bulbs into our garlic field. We separated the bulbs into individual cloves, which were only about the size of a corn kernel, and planted them. We hope these tiny cloves grow into bigger bulbs next year but realize that they will most likely still be quite small. By replanting them in the each year, we hope to grow them into large bulbs and re-establish our farm’s original garlic cultivar. If successful, we will call this garlic cultivar “Cousin Bob’s Rocamole”.
| Cultivar |
Amount Planted |
Expected Yield | ||
| VO | 83# | 332# | ||
| Mu | 50# | 230# | ||
| PI | 63# | 335# | ||
| CR | 54# | 392# | ||
| OR | 57# | 354# | ||
| Totals: | 307# | 1647# | ||
| Field ID | Row | Cultivar | Date | Amount Planted |
| Field 5 | A | CR | 8-Oct-10 | 18# |
| A | CR | 9-Oct-10 | 4# | |
| B | CR | 9-Oct-10 | 22# | |
| C | Mu | 10-Oct-10 | 50# | |
| D | PI | 11-Oct-10 | 20# | |
| D | PI | 13-Oct-10 | 17# | |
| E | PI | 13-Oct-10 | 3# | |
| E | PI | 14-Oct-10 | 10# | |
| E | PI | 16-Oct-10 | 10# | |
| F | VO | 16-Oct-10 | 20# | |
| F | VO | 17-Oct-10 | 20# | |
| G | VO | 17-Oct-10 | 30# | |
| G | VO | 20-Oct-10 | 10# | |
| H | OR | 20-Oct-10 | 10# | |
| H | OR | 22-Oct-10 | 17# | |
| C | OR | 22-Oct-10 | 3# | |
| A | CR | 23-Oct-10 | 6# | |
| B | CR | 24-Oct-10 | 2# | |
| B | BGT | 24-Oct-10 | <1# | |
| C | OR PS | 25-Oct-10 | 5# | |
| C | OR New PS | 1-Nov-10 | 3# | |
| D | OR New PS | 1-Nov-10 | 3# | |
| F | OR New PS | 2-Nov-10 | 8# | |
| G | VO PS | 3-Nov-10 | 3# | |
| G | OR New PS | 3-Nov-10 | 8# | |
| B | PI PS | 10-Nov-10 | 2# | |
| B | CR PS | 10-Nov-10 | 2# |
Notes: Vkoos Odena (VO), Purple Italian (PI), Music (Mu), Chesnok Red (CR), Ohman Red (OR), (BGT) Bank Garlic Transplants
Superscripts: 1) Pre-Soaked (PS) garlic seed cloves prior to planting with a treatment of sodium bicarbonate, seaweed liquid fertilizer and ethyl alcohol. 2) Newly (New) acquired planting stock (controlled treated control group).
