johnmurrey14 Go away with your spam.

Marc, Is your soil warm yet? Pull back the mulch to let it warm up more.

I would leave them since you found that it was still firm, white, and had roots that resisted when you gave it a little tug.

I wouldn't call the soil warm exactly, but it's getting there. We've been having these hot bursts (up to 26 celcius today, way above average) and then it dips back down to 10c for a while, even close to zero a few nights, so maybe it's just being confused like every other plant and animal. :) I'll try to remember to follow up if anything happens, thanks for the input.

Mine has been green all of the strange winter, we had a frost last week after temps in the 70's to 90's (22 to 32 C) with lows above 50 (10+ C)for 6 weeks. They were growing like crazy before the frost! It burned the tips.

Mine usually start growing after the soil temps get above 50F, 10C. If your soil temp, not air temp, is above 10 you should see some life soon!

My garlic is in a rural plot, which I seldom visit until I begin tilling for Spring planting. I just drove out to check on the garlic, expecting to find it growing vigorously due to out abnormally warm Spring. What I found was roughly half of the bulbs dead or dying due to frost heave. Too many times freezing & thawing.

A layer of mulch would have prevented that, but I've never had much of a problem before, so never saw the need to use mulch... to the contrary, it just increased the weeds. It will be added to my planning from now on, though.

I poked around some more yesterday and found one of my shallots, planted next to the garlic, had rotted in the ground so I guess I'm dealing with some mixed results. Not sure if I should sift through the whole allium bed (it's only about (5x5) and replace the ones that didn't survive...

Hmmm. Wonder if they did rot or something. Our garlic has been up about a month now. Ours have never sprouted in the fall....when did you put your cloves in?

Not much you can do at this time. If they didn't make it, then planting later in the fall might be an option for you next year. We seem to plant shortly before Halloween here...we oftentimes want to get them in a bit earlier, but that never works.

No use replacing in the spring....at least for us. We wouldn't find seed, we wouldn't get bulbs from what we planted or they would be very small if we did, and we have lots of other stuff we have to focus on.

Good luck!

I just got back from 3 days away while the weather has been warmer and there are little green tips poking through the earth - hooray! I planted it in the fall, I can't remember the exact date.

Congrats Marc!

The greens died back and lied there for a bit so I dug them up today. Not much! It looks like they just got a bit fat over the winter. Can we still eat these? They smell like garlic (and one flimsy little shallot).

Marc

Congatulations on your success. We gardeners sure are an impatient lot when it comes to sprouting, aren't we?
Sure, you can eat them. Or separate the cloves and replant this fall.

Perhaps it's not obvious from the photo but there are no cloves to separate! They are nearly the same as when I planted them except it looks like they've gotten a bit fat over the winter. Looking more like tiny onions than garlic.

What you have are "rounds," which is what a garlic plant will produce if it doesn't have the resources to make a full divided bulb. As mild as the winter was, if you had significant top growth before a cold snap, it may have killed the tops, leaving the cloves with little resources to grow on. Or maybe the soil is extremely poor/sandy. Or they were planted too close.

But what you said about them growing tops in the fall
and then none in the spring makes me think they were planted too early.

I would plant no sooner than mid October. That way they will establish roots but not too much of a top before cold weather hits. Also make sure to mulch them well with straw or leaves, and make sure there is plenty of organic matter in the soil. In the spring they will need adequate fertility and moisture to reach their full potential, but should be allowed to dry down a bit before harvesting.

Hope this helps,
Jim

Helps a ton, thanks Jim.

I presume these "rounds" can be eaten the same way as garlic is?

Yes, they can be eaten just like cloves. Or they can be planted in the fall. If everything goes well they should form divided bulbs next year. BTW the skinny divided one on the right looks like a shallot and not a garlic to me.