Hi tomatonut,
This is my 2nd attempt to grow garlic here in Florida. Last winters garlic grew green garlic ok, but never did turn into bulbs. I've been looking for another Florida garlic gardner to compare notes with.

The garlic I grew last year was the wrong type. I grew Legacy and Music. Both do better in cold weather areas. This year I made an extra effort to prep the soil ahead of time. I also searched for garlics that are said to do well in warm weather areas. I bought 3 Creole, 2 artichoke, and 2 Marble Purple Stripes to test grow. I also put half of each type in the refrigerator for 6 weeks before planting it last week. What type garlics are you growing?

Michael

Michael

I planted a bunch of softneck varieties and one hardneck. Lorz, Chesnok, Inchelium, Red Toch,and silver white.

So, what about watering the plants? Anyone? Do I leave them alone until they start to show above the soil or do I water regularly?

tomatonut,
You will need to keep the soil moist, but not wet. Cover the soil with at least 2 inches of organic mulch to conserve moisture and feed the soil. I planted my garlic on 10/29 & 10/30, watering each bed right after planting.

Here is what I'm growing...
Artichoke
- Inchelium Red
- Red Toch

Creole
- Burgandy
- Creole Red
- Cuban Purple

Marbled Purple Stripe
- Bogatyr
- Siberian

Lorz was on my wish list too, but I can't grow them all! My "Chilled" Inchelium Red, Red Toch and even a couple Siberian are popping up through the mulch. None of the Creole are up yet.

Michael--please keep us updated as to how the chilled versus un-chilled come out. I was thinking of doing the same.

tomatonut,
How's that Florida garlic growing? My pre-chilled garlic is doing much better than the non chilled. I dug down to take a peek and the chilled are forming little bulbs, the non-chilled are NOT forming bulbs.

My best garlic so far is the Siberian followed by the Inchelium Red. The chilled Siberian and Bogytars are forming scapes. No non-chilled have scapes. The Red Toch looks terribel, like it is finished and needs to be dug up, but a few are still growing.

The Creoles are further behind. Most of them took about a month to sprout. They are smaller plants for sure (so far.) Hopefully they will produce some usable bulbs and some seed stock for next year.

Michael

As another florida gardener, I just wanted to pop in to say Im watching this thread. I've always been interested in growing garlic here in central fl, but haven't gotten to it yet. I hope you both have great crops, and I will keep watching to see what works best. Thanks Jon

Michale and co...

sorry for the delay in the response. I read your question from a meeting in New Mexico and sweated my return...well I have found the same to be true. These beautiful plants with wonderful leaves and thick stems conceal almost no bulb activity....what a bummer. I am hoping that the warm weather with create some bulb growth, but I am beginning to doubt I am going to find success. I planted Inchilleum Red, Red Toq, Silver, and various others and after digging down on several of these varieties I did not feel a bulb forming. So, my fingers are crossed for some miracle to happen in the next few weeks, but otherwise I am getting ready to call this a failed experiment. I will report back and appreciate other reports from Florida.

tomatonut,
My chilled Creoles are starting to get scapes. I dug down and looked at one each of the Burgundy Creoles. The chilled one had a bulb about 7/8 of an inch. The non chilled did not. Both stems were about 5/16 thick at ground level. I still have hopes for the non-chilled Creoles because they are still growing and adding new leaves. The Inchelium Reds have pale looking leaves so I may still have some soil issues. I took soil samples from both of my garlic beds and sent them to a lab today to see if there is anything out of balance. The chilled Siberian and Bogatyr have scapes. The Siberian scapes are curling to 270 degrees. When they start to uncurl, I will cut the scapes off half the plants to see if it makes much of a difference in bulb size. Except for the Creoles, all the non-chilled plants don't really have stems. The leaves just seem to grow from the ground like a fan. Do your plants have a section of stem between each leaf?

Here is a picture of an Inchleium Red bulb. It is about 1&5/16 inches wide.
{{gwi:368568}}

Here is a Siberian I peeked at. It's about 1.5 inches and the stem is about .75 inches at ground level.
{{gwi:368570}}

This picture is a Siberian with a scape(flower stalk). It is pointing down at about 180 degrees in the picture, but is really about 270 now.
{{gwi:368572}}

Here is a shot of the Chilled on left vs. non-chilled on right. Plants in front of bed are Inchelium Reds. The plants in the block holes on the end are chilled, but look past them to see how bad the non chilled garlic looks.
{{gwi:368574}}

WOW, what a striking difference there is and I guess there's little doubt that chillin' is best for your climate conditions. Thought my crop was looking good, but in comparison it is just getting started.

Michael, if you are still following this thread, I'd be very interested in an update on your results with the pre-chilled vs. non-chilled.

All the chilled garlic has been harvested. All had bulbs, but most were small. The largest were the Inchelium Reds and Siberians, they were around 2 inches across. I will grow them again next season. Some scapes were left on and I'm saving some bulbils to try next season also.

NONE of the non-chilled formed bulbs. I'm still nursing some non-chilled plants along, but with the temperature in the mid 90's everyday, they probably won't last much longer. I dug down and looked at a Inchelium Red and a Creole Red today...no bulbs forming at all! Not even making 'rounds'.

I learned alot this growing season, but still have more to learn. I'm installing a T-tape watering system now and will put together a better fertilization program too. Hopefully I can improve on the size of the bulbs a little. If not, I can live with 2 inch bulbs. This fall I will add California Early and Silver White, as well as replant some of my harvested garlic from this season. ( I will pre-chill it for sure!)

You probably want to go with more softneck garlic than hardneck. Here in CA the softnecks ripen considerably earlier. Mine are done now, and the hardnecks are just starting to think about putting up scapes.

Michael, really appreciate the update. Hope to talk more garlic with you and other zone 8-9-10+ folks in the future, as it is definitely a challenge to grow garlic well in the warmer zones, and especially in the South. Hopefully we can all learn from each other and continue to refine our techniques and variety selections.

Wonder why pre-chilling for warm zone growers isn't mentioned or discussed in detail more often. I've googled the heck out of it, and there just doesn't seem to be a lot of folks talking about doing it in detail (at least that I could find anyway). And/or, the advice tends to be mixed. I briefly thought about trying it before, but didn't. In any case I am very glad I saw this thread and plan to do some pre-chilling next time.

I've grown smaller amounts of garlic on and off for several yrs now, but only started to get serious about it in fall of '07 - for my harvest last spring.

Yesterday and today, I harvested a lot of the garlic. Dug all the artichoke types, the one Asiatic/Turban I was growing (Red Janice), and a couple of creole types as they just screamed "ready." Not many leaves left on the ones I dug (and the ones left in are starting to go fast), so I can't leave them much longer or I might lose "storage" layers of wrapper. Unfortunately, early May weather is really hot here this yr - already 90's with heat index up to 100's. Definitely got hot faster than last May. Not good for the garlic, and also for getting much more significant fruit set on my March planting of tomatoes.

I am growing Siberian this yr too, and it is still in. The "fan" of leaves is just now starting to go now, and plenty of green ones left towards the center. I can already tell though by feel of the bulbs, that this is going to turn out very nicely, large and good clove formation. Leaving in just a little longer, but will watch leaves carefully/daily. Will definitely grow this one again. Metechi (another mps) is still in, but I think it is going to be a bit smaller than the Siberian, even though I can feel that has formed cloves. It did okay for me last yr, not outstanding but "avg", but I thought I would try again because of the favorable comments on the Gourmet Garlic Gardens site - he says it is one of the very best for him, go figure.

Of the Artichokes I harvested today, Red Toch, Chet's Italian Red, and Lorz turned out the best. For the most part, large bulbs (for here anyway -- 2-2.5") and good clove formation. Inchelium Red also did well, so this makes 2 yrs in a row for me of good results with this var - and another good one for storage, IME.

Asiatic/Turban types have given me inconsistent results overall, I rend to get a lot of rounds. One I tried last yr that did well was Red Janice, and it managed to consistently form cloves again this time, but bulbs a bit smaller than last time. Stores well.

Creole Red did well for me, as it also did last yr. Cuban Purple (also creole) did well too, first time with it.

Here is a link that might be useful: garlic album

Promethean, thanks for chiming in here too. I don't even bother with hardnecks here, as they really just don't do well in the South, as far as I can tell from talking to others that have tried it. Well, they *can* do well sometimes, but are definitely less certain. I have mainly been focusing on artichoke and creole types to ensure I can produce enough to meet my needs for an entire yr + share a bit with friends.

Here in Texas, artichokes seem to be the best bet, and creoles are a close second (both softneck here, although I have seen creoles grown in cooler climes that went hardneck, just sayin'). *Some* MPS and *some* asiatic/turban might work here, depends. In general, hit and miss for me so far.

Thanks for the updates from Zones 9 and up---I finally got around to harvesting my garlic and also found the following varieties worked fairly well (Lorz Italian, Red Toch, and Inchelium Red)--these all produced many 2.5-3" bulbs, but there were also those that were much smaller from these varieties.

The one Hardneck variety I planted, Chesnok Red, did terrible and I was also disappointed with the production of Silver White. I don't know why, but for some reason, I thought this one would do well. I still have about 10 plants that need to be pulled of that variety so perhaps something will come of them. Since this is my first time growing garlic I don't know if I did well or not.

I knew it would be difficult in central Florida (all the farmer's markets only seem to offer elephant garlic and all...those that I have asked at least...claim you cannot grow ""normal garlic" in the state--so that felt good to sort of prove some of them wrong), but I know I have more to learn.

To recap:
None of my cloves were pre-chilled
No plant produced a scape
All were grown in a rich medium I mixed into a raised bed
I ordered too late to obtain creole bulbs which I am dying to try this fall

Questions....

What do I do with the plants that look like a leek when I pulled them up? No real bulb...or something that looks like it wanted to be bulb, maybe only an inch across....can I use these or do they go into the compost pile?

What is the typical success rate...(germination probably isn't the right word), but I was surprised to find that many of the cloves did not sprout.

Should I save some of the bulbs that grew well to plant this fall or order more seed stock? I thought I read that the bulbs you grow in your garden will actually adapt to your climate and soil...is this true?

Well, I certainly won't have the problem of having to figure out how to store all of these garlic bulbs I imagined, but I think I won't have to buy any for the rest of the summer

Hi!

Thanks for this info, tomatonut! I'm in SoCal (born/raised in Atlanta), and have had a bit of interesting experience myself.

I buy garlic from one of the local farmer's markets. I planted some of that, since I knew the farmer was sort of nearby, so the garlic would be better adapted. I'll have to remember to ask what he plants.

I also planted Asian Tempest, Romanian Red, Chesnok Red, Brown Tempest, California Early, and a "found" hardneck from tennessee from another member here. I also planted bulbils from the Tennessee hardneck and the farmer's market variety.

Everything is in sub-irrigated planters. Watering here in the summer is AWFUL, so this is my way of handling it.

My brown tempests have scaped. The california early has bulbed, but the leaves haven't died back yet. The Romanian Red still looks like a leek, and so does the chesnok. The asian tempests are starting to swell, but have not made cloves. The local farmer's market variety is starting to swell also, but I'm seeing rounds in my future.

I planted out over 2 weeks in october. One round of Asian Tempests were planted 2 weeks later, and those are way smaller in height.

I'll keep this post updated. :)

Know this is an old post, but for others who find it....I tried to grow garlic as well, but got the leek looking plants. I found some of the answers I needed here, but to answer the question as to what to do with the plant that did not bulb, but looks like a leek....I chopped it and used it in a stir fry. It has a bit of a garlic/onion taste. Not too strong, but added some flavor and surely must have some nutrient value. So in answer to your question you can cook with it.

"Leek looking" means that they are not done. Have to give them more time, as long as top is green.Maybe your garlics need another 6 weeks or so.