Will do Martin.
However I only have the 2 with the scapes so I will cut 1 off and stick it in water and watch.I will have to find a vase or other thats deep enough or cut the scape so that it wont tip or fall out of the vase.LOL Other than this way I'll have to stick the scape in a gal milk container or bucket and leave it outdoors in the shade or garage.
I assume the scapes should be ready at the same time the garlic bulbs are and post an update then.Right now the garlic is at only 3 leaves that are yellowing,scapes did straighten up another inch over the last day and night.
So the covering sheath will split-good to know.I cant say how yours look as far as the color of the bulbils but I have noticed its only those(2 on each scape)that get the most full sun that I can see any striping or color on.They also seem to be the biggest bulbils.
Bill

Indeed, a 5-gallon bucket will do for a scape "vase". That's exactly what I used last year! I stumbled onto that method by accident. I was between compost tumbler batches and thus holding back any green material during the week that I had loads of scapes to cut off. I put the lot of them into a pail of water to keep them green until needed. Next I know, most had shed the sheath and were maturing just as if still attached to the plant. As they were all mixed up, I never bothered saving any but had loads of garlic coming up in the compost area this spring!

As for my "heirloom", it wasn't called a topsetter for nothing. It indeed has the largest bulbils that I've yet seen. An old Bavarian neighbor lady used to gather some of them for cooking as they were often larger than many softneck cloves. At the moment, I'm waiting for mine to split the sheath so I can see exactly how many bulbils are in each cluster. I'm thinking about a dozen maximum is the normal and the lowest number of all that I know. On the opposite end, Music probably has close to 200 bulbils in a good cluster but many no larger than a grain of wheat.

Martin

Well Martin I have decided on just the 1 gal. milk container,thats about all I have thats handy and not in use.
The scape is 14 inches from where it comes out of the mainstem(top leaf)has unfurled a bit more(not even as hooked as a cane handle made for walking-almost like a #7).
Now up very close I can actually count 7 large cloves showing in the sheath-thought 8 the other night.Yes it does look like there are more smaller 1s stuck between or down further in the pods.
Darn I did have a third scape off in an unweeded area that I plan on sticking a row of beans,maybe a few cukes in(still time here)if I can find the time soon.ThE Scape was there last night and looking for it to compare and see if it was another of yours(I do think it is 1 of my storebought that has acclimated here over the last 4 years)
Seems the grandaughter found it off and away from the plant(cut/snapped/nipped off right at the top of the stem at where the pod was)Urge to kill LOL.Anyway she liked the bulbils and ate em-says she got the hot surprise after the sweet nothing taste.Now who the heck would pop off my scape???Cripes even the tree rats/birds and woodchuck won't go near the garlics.I'm out now to cut the scape and put it in the jug with a few inches of water.Its going in the shade on 1 of the porches where I have the 2 bulbs I pulled drying.I hope this is ok.
Will keep you posted weekly if need be.
Please -what do I do when the sheath splits?Just leave them in the water for that 1 or on the plant in the garden that has the scape leave the bulbils and take them off when I pull the bulb?
Bill

Well, Bill, you'll just have to see what happens since I don't know exactly how far along they are. Unlike many of the hardnecks, you will probably never see those scapes straighten out. I think that there is just too much weight in those heavy bulbils so most are somewhere between a 30 and 45 degree angle. Remember, what you are doing is an separate experiment to confirm my findings of last year. No doubt there will be others who also will try it. With everything else going on last year, I have no idea what those scapes looked like from day to day. I only know that when I finally got around to doing something with all of those extra scapes, I was looking at loads of mature bulbils and no clue as to which varieties were involved!

Martin

Martin,
My Lee purple strip scapes, if cut and left in a shady place will continue to develope the bubils with out being in water. Of course that was before I found how delicious scapes are. None escape that way anymore.
Running the same test with leek scapes.

Martin
The scapes made the night.The 1 I left on the plant has a stem before the bulbils at 17 inches,it does seem it wont straighten out or up any more.
The pod did and has split open on the east side since last night.
Scape in the gal jug is looking the same after being snipped off yesterday.

Please -what do I do when the sheath splits?Just leave them in the water for that 1 or on the plant in the garden that has the scape leave the bulbils and take them off when I pull the bulb?I'm confused a bit with this issue due to it being my first time with allowing the bulbils to mature on the plant or in a jug.
Bill

Bill, as Coho mentioned, the allium bulbils or seeds will continue to develop and mature even if not in water. Those stalks are solid and loaded with moisture and energy. Thus the scapes will continue maturing even after being picked. I would think that the bulbils would be sufficiently mature and viable by the time they burst the sheath. After that, only the ultimate size would be determined by additional nutrients.

On a growing plant, the bulbil cluster is the last portion to dry. When the bulbils are fully mature and dry, they'll simply fall off with minimal disturbance. It will be up to you to determine when that time arrives. Mine were left in the pail for probably up to 3 weeks before I got back to them. By then, many bulbils were falling off on their accord. That's why this is an experiment now. It's to determine how long it takes for the scape to go from sheath-breaking to dry bulbils while no longer a part of the parent plant. Fun, eh? I'll be doing it with other varieties as soon as I think that the bulbils are developed enough.

Martin

Ok Martin-got ya,and thanks.
I'll keep watch over the Martin' Old Heirlooms in the jug and post as we go along here.I'm don't intend to keep any record other than mental but I'll most likely remember I cut off and stuck them in the jug July 11th.Wow I would have liked to keep track of this from when I put the cloves in the ground last late fall/early winter until now or from when I first saw green sprouts pop up this spring.
Maybe I'll take notes starting this fall and do a repeat experiment for a few years and come up with some type of timeline.I bet it will be different for the fall planted and the spring planted by a few 3 weeks.
Bill

To keep this thread going and not let it fall back past page 3.
3rd time with trying to get a post to submit.Whats with my puter or is it the allium forum?
Bulbils on the Martins Old heirloom in the garden still on the plant have split from top to bottom and the split sheath has widened to about half an inch.I can fully see 2 bulbils at the bottom of the pod and now notice there is another over those so I can now understand Martins posting about there being 11 or so bulbils to a pod.
The snipped scape&pod in the gal. jug have not split yet.
The bulbil pod in the jug feels alot softer/wimpy like as opposed to the 1 still on the plant.I think the pod in the jug that was only 14 inches height may be a few weeks behing the 1 in the garden which I see now will not straighten up any farther but will soon bend back down due to the bulbils growing larger.The scape in the garden did go from about 17+inches to almost 19 where its at in height now.
btw Martin -those 2 I thought to be possible your softneck Inchellium,when I pulled 1 an hour ago(it looked ready)turned out to be what I think is an Elephant corm/bulbil that I had planted at the same time last late fall/early winter.It came up only 1 large bulb with no hint of seperation and had 4 small corm/bulbils hanging from and off/out of the roots.In a post that would not post I had questioned about the bulbils(Martins Old heirloom) in the pod in the garden asking what the small rootlike/leaflike things were in the pod attatched to the bulbils.I can also now say after seeing the corm/bulbils on the Elephant bulb that these must be the small seed/flower part thats from the part inside the scape pod that would be flowers if it were not a topsetter.
Bill

Growing plant scape/pod has split to about 3/8 of the pod,from top to bottom.I can see another bulbil down under now.They look to be putting on size quickly,those that are in there.I can also see 2-3 small dead/dried what look like would have been even more bulbils(can these be actual seed like my small allium flowers put out after flowering?) ?) but just never got pollinated or whatever it is that causes them to grow into bulbils.Looks like ther will be 11 Martin as you mentioned but maybe a third row lower down will develop a few more bulbils before its time to pull the plant.
Plant scape in the gal jug doesn't seem to be doing much of anything,looks about the same as when cut & stuck it in the jug,possibly just a bit larger.The pod has not split the sheath.Maybe next week.
Will it help if I put it in the sun Martin or leave it in total shade as it is now?
Bill

Bill, thus far, our high today has been 94F. Anything and everything possible is in shade today, that includes all harvested garlic plus myself! I noticed some of my bulbils have exposed themselves today when the sheaths have halfway split. Most of them quickly turn a nice red or purple color as soon as they are exposed to the daylight. Ready or not, they should be coming out of the ground in another week. I've left all of the scape on those plants in order to gain more planting stock.

Martin

I have set next weekend as my *ready or not they come out day* myself Martin.I do intend to leave the Old Martins heirloom in another week or so after that,just to watch and see where the bulbils go.If they look ready to fall or the plant goes 3/4 dead I'll pull it.As of now not much rain forecast here for the next 10 days,subject to change at any time LOL.80s here yesterday today and tomorrow with high humidity,scape in gal. container looks ok,it seems to be slow going.
The scape still inground is close to having another bulbil show on the top part of the sheath -its open more and widening some each day.I can see 5 dark maroon/purple bulbils now,3 top/2 bottom and another with no color on the top.

I dug a few with more yellowing,finally I have a bulb that has 5 cloves,I now know I planted to deeply-2" max come this fall,after I slightly hill the rows-then later will come the layer mulch,straw 1st then an inch of leaves and more straw.Funny thing now come to think of it,I have not gotten many with 10-20 cloves except for those left unpulled to overwinter for spring garlic,shallow from now on without being afraid they wont come up if I plant that way.
Bill

MOh=Martind Old heirloom out in the garden has now split the sheath in 2 other spots,I can see where the bulbils that are turning color where the scape had not split is where the sheath seems to split first-the scape is still at the #7 position.This scape in the ground with the bulbil pod is growing very fast.I also note the cloves in the bulb are doing the same.

Scape in the container has does not seem to have done much but I can see coloring starting on the bulbils,I can count 9 in there,4 have color,scape should split any day,maybe tonight-it has a small wearing appearance in 1 area.

*Tip of scape(both in garden on plant) and stem and scape in container have dried from the tip down just about over an inch.Over the last week I have noticed especially on the plant n the garden that as the tip dries it seems the bulbils grow faster.Scape tip in the garden now has a yellowing stripe running down almost to the pod.
Scapes themselves from where they are/were on the plant up to the pod are still hard & green,the 1 in the container is a bit whimpy- still about the same whimpy but green since the day I cut it off and stuck it in the container(Gal. milk jug)
Bill

Have a bit if change with Martins Old heirllom.
garden plant--1 of the first larger bulbils at the bottom of the pod looks like it has split apart some.
Scape has now turned 100% around and is faceing West,been facing East until now right from the start.Looks like the bulbils have added a bit of size but the sheat hasn't split any more from yesterday.
Scape and bulbil pod in the gal jug container seem to be the same-no change.
92f here now with the realfeel at 102F-still very humid.
Bill

Bill, didn't you know that I'd trained those scapes to always point back to their home? I think that that's an indication that they still are developing and searching for the sun. Mine are still in the ground and the bulbil sheath has split on nearly all of them. I just need a free hour now so that I can dig them and give them a few days to dry out. Then I'll clip the bulbil clusters off one end and bulbs off the other. After that, further curing for both in mesh bags. The need for placing the scape in water is only when they are cut before the bulbils are sufficiently developed. You'll learn! Don't get too nervous that you may do something wrong. Nobody else really knows what we're doing either! I won't allow you to lose that variety now that I've got you hooked on it!

Martin

Martin, On your old heirloom, does leaving the scape on for bubil harvest, reduce the bulb size as it does with other garlics, and especially, Elephant?

Scape in garden is about the same as yesterday(7am now -I expect more results/growth by this pm).I can see more color from the 7 bulbils that I can clearly see and those that were smaller look to have filled out a bit more.
Now the scape/pod in the container does look to be acting differently.It still hasn't split the sheath BUT there is surely a growth pattern that I didn't see on the 1 in the garden.IT seems to be growing those 1st bulbils very uniformly instead of just the 1 or 2 that grew large before the rest,the 5 scapes that I can see color on under the sheath are very close to equal in size.I wonder if its a pollination thing that goes on there in the pods.
Bill

Update for Martins Old heirloom experiment.
Scape n pod in gal. jug container still has no change from last post Wed.

Plant with scape left on in garden is doing great still,bulbils expanding.The sheath has now been fully half disrobed,but only where the first splitting occured.The other 2 recent splits have not changed.I can count more than the 11 now.

Would like to note that the tip of the scape(garden) above the bulbils has almost totally dried down to nada.Must be due to the high heat/U.V & the humidity lifting over the past 2 days(container scape/sheath has not dried down any more than the inch I first posted on above someplace).
hey Martin -the pod came from the (facing West)
#7 position almost to straight up over last night,just noticed the dried scape tip this morning.I bet its ready to dump bulbils or drop down bent in half very soon.

All garlic I think I need to wait until tomorrow to pull as I just had an unfinished root canal and LOL I'm going to try to hold a few cloves of garlic on the temporary filling that was stuck in until next time which shall I was promised be less than an hour not 2 like today.If oil of cloves works maybe fresh garlic cloves will work even better.
Bill

No change on the scape/pod in the container,except a nip has been taken out of the sheath over 1 bulbil and also out of the bulbil.Methinks granddaughter was hungry again for a taste of the inside things in the pods.LOL-says she was just looking.
Now the scape in the garden has been expanding but no further sheath has opened in the areas that had started.It seems the bulbils are growing and pushing out in the area that was were the sheath split for the first time.Bulbils have now a black area on the top or bottom(whichever way you are looking at them)(The outer showing area nearer the sheath) where they had first turned purple/maroon red.
Now I was a bit excited yesterday when 4 of the little stringlike things that I had thought were unpollinated or whatever bulbils that hadn't developed.They had just turned purple and looked like they would open-as to flower-I am also missing 3 of the 4 flower type thingies.I was so hoping I would see a few flowers and maybe even get some really small seed type things from them.
Have you ever seen this happen Martin?
Whats with the blackening of the bulbils on the top or bottom?
Dug up all the garlic yesterday but left the 1 Martins Old heirloom in to see more of its growth habit for another week or 2.
I was surprised to get a few that have numerous cloves(more than a dozen-thin,had scapes so hardneck I gather)I can't say if they are the artichoke or other variety that has the numerous cloves 2 varieties from your mix I think.
Biggest bulbs are from Martins Old heirloom.I may measure them tonight.
Some were down close to a foot but did well for me,almost just as well as those close to the surface at 3 inches.But they look great and I have over-
grand total of =48 good sized bulbs,about 2 dozen garlic rounds and 4-8 elephant large elephant rounds along with about a dozen bulblets of the elephant.
Probably 5 varieties all told but maybe next year I'm going to pick up varieties that come with a name attached so I will know what I have and can call them by name.
Experiment will continue Martin.I hope those bulbils that have the brown/black top/bottom are bulbils that are actually at full readiness to go in in the fall with no sprouting/growing problems,they feel very hard with no rot or mold that I can see.
Would you recommend pulling up the garlic now with the scape that has the bulbils or am I correct in thinking I can still wait awhile and see what happens?
Bill

Bill, sounds like the bulbils in Massachusetts are doing about the same as in Wisconsin. Those in the water may not have been far enough along to properly mature but I wouldn't bet against them. The fact that they exist is enough to think that they'll be as viable as any other. You don't have to be concerned about their color as a "blackish-purple" or brown is normal.

As for when to dig the one with the bulbils, now's the time. I just dug all of mine this aft. All but two of the bulbils had split the sheaths. Several exposed bulbils have green tips on them already as if they are anxious to begin growing again. It good to hear that someone else is impressed with their size. With only 4 varieties remaining to lift, my old one is running a close race with Siberian for size. Even the biggest Music could not beat them!

There is a drawback to something which uses a lot of energy to produce a big bulb plus lots of big bulbils. The bulb and clove skins are very thin. Through this past week, there's been close to 5 inches of rain here. That came at the right time for almost everything else except garlic. Thus about half of mine are missing most of the outer skins. That's no problem as they will still store for a long time.

Overall, I'm very, very pleased with today's harvest. For the most part, my old garlic got no better or worse care than any of the others. If anything, those in the main bed had the worse of it as that row was only about 4" from the edge of that raised bed. Thus their soil dried up twice as quickly as the rest. Next problem will be to get them into other Northern gardens where they can impress others!

Martin

Martin, can I ask why Northern gardens? Is this type of garlic not suited to a zone more Southern? (Like, say, zone 9 in California?!) What makes certain garlics do better South or North? I am a tomato grower by nature :)

~Thalia

*ahem*, sorry, I can see my question is better adressed under FAQ.

~Thalia

Thalia, you're forgiven for asking that question here! There indeed ARE reasons why some do better here than in California and v.v. You'll find the answers to that somewhere around here shortly.

Martin

Lets not scroll off to page 2 or farther.
Dug out the (MOh)Martins Old heirloom and its still on the green side-all other garlic dug last week is dried/drying down to nothing as far as the leaves go.

Scape&bulbils in container are still ok-getting a bit larger and look to be matureing,scape&pod are starting to turn yellow.
Bulbils on the scape(still on the plant dug from the garden are I assume fully mature.I was really hoping to see what would come of the small flowers(in the bulbil pod)would look and turn into but I guess I'll have to wait until next year.
FYI-these bulbils now kinda look like small acorns with the cap popped off.I can't wait for Oct/Nov.to put them in the ground.
Pod in container looks to have about 11 bulbils at the moment(maybe it needs a drop or 2 of liquid fert.)Pods on plant from the garden has about 15 bulbils,bulbils seem to be about the same size in both pods.
*Bulb from earlier cut off scape plant that were put in the container looks to be the biggest bulb from this years garden.The plant that had the scape left on seems to have a bulb about half an inch smaller then the 1 I didn't cut the scape off.Either way-cloves are big,huge to my way of thinking for other than the normal cal.store bought (10-20 clove)variety.Bulbs have the nice striped/mottled red color-very attractive as compared to the white stuff found & sold in every day grocery stores & 8-11 large(not jumbo)cloves
Looking foreward to frying up a few cloves(mixed types and a few seperate of (MOH0come this weekend.I will also be trying a few cloves straight up raw,some just seared and some mant added to a roast.Can hardly wait.

Martin,I did notice the red/mottled stripes seem not to go through the bulb but are just on the surface 1-2 layers of sheath paper/wrapper.Will be finding out whats underneath a few soon.Yummmmmm
Bill

By golly, Bill, you are indeed describing that old thing to a T! I was looking at the bulbils this evening and some are as large or larger than the first year Music rounds. German Porcelain bulbs and bulbils are very close in size but not identical. We can almost be certain that it's a porcelain but that's about all.

A few red streaks are normal on the bulb wrappers. However, the cloves will have a very thin white wrapper. If everything went according to normal, you could have had almost 2 complete rings of cloves. Again, I think that that is a porcelain trait.

Go ahead and cook a few cloves and see how they measure up to other garlic that you're growing. I think that you'll definitely want to hold a lot back for a larger crop. Can't build Rome in a day!

Martin

2 complete rows of rings almost Martin.
Sounds great-thats the way the bulbils look.
Those cloves in the bulbs though are so tight and large together there is no way I can see under them to look for another row.I'll be sure to open first that bulb that was first dug-thats the 1 I kept the scape in a bucket of.I'll also note the wrappers on the cloves.
Bill

Bill, that old variety has even impressed me now! It did the best that it could here and I was happy. Just back from where harvest is going on in a field which I helped plant last fall. Mine was already hanging in the barn with everything bragging size. Nothing under 2" and it was very uniform. I was happy to see that as I know that it is at least acclimated to this area and that it wasn't just my garden.

Martin

Martin
I opened the bulb from the Martins Old heirloom that I had cut the scape off of.
Now it was at 7" around at the widest,the bulb dug that still has the scape/bulbils attached is 6 1/2 inches.

Bulb I opened could have used another week to dry,been so humid here with only last week a few very dry days I think with my drying method of just spreading out on a picknik table in the shade the larger bulbs will need the 3rd week to dry down for a good storage lenght.

Bulb had 4 outer sheath wrappers on-some bulbs had good wrapper with 4 having only about half the wrapper-probably came off when I took the outer ones off.the 4 having only about half look to be double cloves that probably should have split.I guess it could have been left inground another few weeks for complete division and growth.

Clove wrappers are darker and streaked as you say,more darker and not spotted/mottled maroon/red as the outer bulb sheath/wrapper.

What surprised me was that there were only 11 cloves.
10 large and 1 smaller.
There was no inner tier or ring/row,just the 1,also on the other Old heirloom we used.

Definitely no mixup,maybe I'll get rings in the other Old Heirlooms when I open them over the next few months.

Taste has way less heat than the uncooked cloves,we liked and enjoyed them much(the dozen roasted cloves we ate).I fried a few bulbs/cloves of other varieties from your mix,they were loved mixed in with the fried onions.
Bill

This should have read above as=
*Cloves---Bulb had 4 outer sheath wrappers on-some *cloves had good wrapper with 4 having only about half the wrapper.
Bill

I roughly checked those which have either lost most of the skins or close to it. One small one had only 7 cloves but most others have 10 to 13. What I called a second ring is not really that. Some may have 8 or 9 in a normal tight fashion and then 3 or 4 smaller cloves outside those. They would be almost like bulblets. One thing is that my old garlic doesn't have the extra large cloves normally associated with many hardnecks. Instead, they are just about normal garlic press size. You'll also find that they keep a lot longer than many other hardnecks.

Martin

The results are now in here for our Martin's garlic. 3 bulbs over 2 inches and 20 came in well over 2 1/2 inches. They're all beautiful, not a single runt or mis-shapen bulb out of the bunch!! I bet if we'd have taken better care of the field this year that we'd have easily done even better with them. I think Martin's garlic is equivalent to the "magic beans" of garlic. :-)

Flowers, between Bill and yourself, I'm really between a rock and a hard spot! Already planted an extra dozen cloves of my old one last year after spreading it around the country for others to try. That says nothing about those which didn't pass through the kitchen. What the heck? For 20 years or so, that was our ONLY garlic other than forever trying to get a decent elephant bulb. One sort of gets used to a certain taste and it's hard to change.

Anyway, with no real goal in mind, I'm thinking of converting a sizable chunk of the potato patch over to garlic and most of that being that old one. Not for any financial gain but just that it's a good one that deserves to be in more gardens. I really would not like to see it become a commercial variety without really proving itself to be different. I'll readily admit that the size has slowly increased over the year but I figured that it was my good for giving it better soil. The red or purple streaks also seem to have increased over the years. To me, it's no longer exactly the same variety as when I first grew it. I'll be planting as much as I can to get it into circulation. What a legacy, eh? Having a garlic named for me!

Martin

Just let me know if you run out of room Martin, I can always save you a spot in the field. It's a great one to share!

Martin - how many bulbs of MOH did you harvest this year (just trying to get a sense of scale)? I would love to be the granite state keeper of the flame. If you don't have enough for this year, perhaps you can put me down for next. I am happy to trade, and have a local unidentified Rocambole that a local farm has been growing for quite a while that does very well in my (our?) zone which might interest you. I also have eight or so fairly mainstream hardnecks.

UncleJohn, I planted 27 cloves total. 15 in the main allium bed and another 12, at the last minute, in a separate bed. The extra dozen was just in case something went wrong in the main bed. Turned out for the better despite having been under ice for an extra several weeks. The extra dozen probably turned out even in size and maturity date due to better sunlight, a long-standing problem here. Anyway, don't worry as all main contributors here will have a chance at both cloves and bulbils. And it would indeed be nice to see a bigger chunk of "Flowers'" field devoted to that proven variety.

Martin

Count me in Martin, if you have enough stock and time.

And could you send some rain out here?

Martin, I pretty sure by now your stock is deplenished... But if by chance you still have some I would like to keep it going in NC...I have Russian Red or Hawaiann White to trade..Let me know..
thanks Winemaker

Martin,
To get back to scapes and bubils. I just cleaned the 2nd Fridge and found a half dozen scapes under some cukes that needed to be composted. They have developed bubils so set them aside for the time being.

Personally, I don't understand why more garlic fanciers aren't trying to grow it from bulbils. So what if it takes two seasons? Gardeners are willing to wait more than that just for a few spears of asparagus or rhubarb. There's also nothing wrong with getting a lot of rounds other than not fitting in a garlic press. Either way, one has to save some of the harvest to plant back. If you stayed at it long enough, and have separate areas for mature or juvenile plants, you could use 100% of the divided bulbs for cooking or sale. You'd only be planting back rounds and bulbils.

Martin

Upon asking about bulbil planting one response indicated that it might take 3-4 seasons for bulbs to size up. (Although recently another forum member observed that bulbils produced smallish bulbs rather than rounds in the very first season.) In any case, I am going to plant several hundred bulbils (mostly chesnock red, and quite small) with a 1" spacing in mid or late October.

Hello Martin and Folks,

Just a quick note to let all you garlic lovers know that my great garlic experiment is now finished. I got 2 inch bulbs from bulbils in just one season... cool eh?
I'll be posting pictures and info later this week as my computer is on the fritz and it crashes when i mess with my picture files... frustrating.
(yes they were Martins heirloom topsetters)

Martin do you have any bulbils left?
I want to repeat this experiment again to see if it was a fluke...
I would only need maybe a dozen if you can spare them...
if your out thats ok.

I'll post as soon as i can.

thanks folks,

Matti

Matti, it was NOT a fluke! That's what those large bulbils will do! They've been doing that for 20+ years here so I almost knew what to expect from Ontario. And that was a spring planting. The bulbs would have been bigger if you would have had them last fall.

My only regret is that I don't have a "ton" of them to share. No problem as I just have to get all other projects out of the way. Then I can sort out what I have for actual numbers and how many I can share. For mailing convenience, I may offer it as a mix of loose cloves and bulbils so that I can use a simple padded envelope.

John, small bulbils of the Music type will indeed probably take 3 seasons to become full-sized bulbs. There are two basic types of hardneck garlic bulbils, small and large. As many have noted, the small ones can be as small as a grain of wheat. The large ones may be almost as large as a marble. In one season, that's where the Music ones are now, the same size as the fresh bulbils of my old one. They may produce a divided bulb next year but it would not surprise me to get only large rounds.

Martin

Martin, thanks  it makes sense that the tiny bulbils would take longer (and my Chesnock bulbils are wheat sized). I hope that they don't take three seasons, and may not plant them all (anyone out there want some Chesnock Red bulbils?).

Ironically, of the four types I have bulbils for, they are inversely proportional to the bulb size. My smallest bulbs of all varieties I grew were my Korean Reds (avg 1.56"), and those produced the largest bulbils (medium-large peas); while my Chesnock Reds and Purple Glazers were my 2nd and 3rd largest (both averaging just under 2") produced the wheat-sized bulbils.

One lesson I am taking out of this for next season is that I am going to let scapes mature on a few (2-3?) of each variety I am growing.

On another note, I picked up another personalized topset garlic at the Vermont Garlic Festival. This particular farm had received these from a neighbor and named them Elmer's Topset in honor of him. ET has done so well for Dancing Veggies Farm that it is the only variety they grow now. The actual strain is unknown, but they think it might be Purple Glazer.

-John

Martin, here in Southern California would I leave bulbils in the ground year round for the two years it would take to mature them, or would I have to dig them up each summer? Maybe this is really one for the FAQ (which I could certainly use in my newbiness!)

I am sure finding all of this fascinating, and hope to try some hardneck here, even though I understand it isn't the best garlic for this zone.

~Thalia

Thalia,
I see no reason that hardnecks will not do well in you z9.
I am on the line of 8 and 9, mostly 9 lately. I have 2 red stripes that always do well.

My understanding is that some hardnecks do better in southern climes than others. Rocamboles particularly like very cold weather, and do not size up as well unless they have a good freeze. That doesn't mean that rocs are not worth growing in your region. On the other hand, some hardnecks do pretty well even with warm winters. Most online stores will mention the winter preferences of most their strains.

One category for you to consider is Creoles. My understanding is that they are technically softnecks, but they share many characteristics with hardnecks including flavor and bulbils. Here is the general description from Filaree Farms:

" While Creoles are a subgroup of the Silverskin variety, they have certain similarities with Purple Stripe garlics, including vivid clove colors, tallish cloves with elongated tips, and numerous tiny bulbils. They differ in that flower stalks are very short and weak. While bulb wrappers are usually off white, the cloves are a striking solid red or purple. Creoles do best in southern latitudes. They will survive in northern climates, but produce only medium to large size bulbs. They have an initially sweet flavor accompanied with a heat that builds in intensity."

I ordered Creole Red from them this year, and both the cloves and bulbs I received were very large. I was assured that they will do okay in my winters, but they should thrive in yours.

Thanks for that encouragement, coho and John! I suppose it is too late to order this year for this fall planting, but I'll look into it, especially the Creoles mentioned.

~Thalia

Thalia, it is NOT too late to order for this fall planting. Your selection will be limited, but I would encourage you to go ahead. There were several stores listed in a thread here recently. I have been in contact with Fialree Farms via phone over the past few days, and they are sending me a little replacement Creole Red today, so I know they still have some of that in stock. (Replacement for shipment damage, I am still happy with Filaree at this point; annoyed at ups tho).

You might want to visit filaree online and get some ideas, and then call them to see what they still have and would suggest for your location. (you can also do this with any of the suggested online retailers; I have found filaree and garlicsmiths easier to get on the phone than gourmet garlic gardens and the garlic store).

-John

Thanks again, John - lots of info at Filaree!

~Thalia

Martin, Are you offering your hierloom mix anymore?? If so how can I get some....I must have missed How to obtain..
Thanks for any info... Joey