I've seen this... it basically naturalizes. You are exactly right.

There was an old belief that roses and garlic planted together provide nutrients to each other (perhaps because the garlic and roses have "opposite" scents) and look at really old gardens in old residential neighborhoods, where the original owners have long moved on, sometimes you see garlic growing freely around the roses.

The cloves may indeed get smaller, due to competition and overcrowding, neglect or imperfect growing conditions. But unlike tulips or daffodils, a small garlic bulb behaves much like a large one; the plant will grow, bloom, re-seed and divide - just with a smaller/shorter plant.

They CAN spread, though, because the bubils have a very high germination rate and fall anywhere from a few inches to a few feet from the parent plant. That allows the colony to advance much more quickly than it would if they were simply dividing in place.

That sounds pretty cool because I plan on releasing some of my smaller cloves out into the woods where there is some light just to see how they grow naturally as nobody seems to post pictures of it online. I just hope they can hold their own against the native weeds around here.

Given that other people have access to that area as well, I'm just hoping no one will notice it as pretty much anyone has a use for garlic.

I wouldn't worry about the neighbors taking your garlic. By the time it starts to yellow it will barely be noticeable. Also, if it's grown in a low fertile, low light area, it will most likely be so small that no one will want to deal with it.

It's actually on the south side of the woods so it's a pretty sunny location with pretty good soil, but I plan on growing them so far and in between so that there won't be a bed of garlic sticking out.

But yea, once they do start to yellow in July, they should have a much lower profile as from then on, their bulbs should multiply, get smaller and less desirable unless someone wants little bulbs.

I never plan on harvesting them. I just want them for observation so I'll pick out certain landmarks to make the experimental garlic plantings.

I'm not sure exactly what species you are planning to naturalize. I like to grow and harvest onions in my vegetable garden here in Indiana. But I believe that Allium vineale (Wild garlic) and Allium canadense (Wild onion) are considered "prohibited noxious weeds" here. Google those 3 words. Just make sure you don't need a permit.

I'm growing softnecks since they have a lower profile and multiply much easier. These guys are planted right at the base of either a power line or anything that makes it easy to find, but the only goal is to find out if it can naturalize and grow in a natural environment which I believe is possible as long as squirrels don't start eating them.

Softnecks seldom produce bulbils, but tend to produce many cloves per bulb; so you would probably end up with a large, tight cluster similar to chives. I've missed harvesting a few softneck bulbs in the garden, and that is what happens to them the following year. I use the greens like chives.

Hardnecks form bulbils, or should... not sure how the shade from the trees will impact that. Provided that bulbils form, you should get the "walking" effect described by Pizzuti. The bulbs themselves are more sensitive to crowding & weed pressure than softnecks, and will probably form smaller bulbs which multiply slowly. The total effect would probably result in a spreading, more open clump.

The main question, I suppose, is whether the clumps would survive over time. Only one way to find out, I suppose. It sounds like an interesting experiment... one which I may try as well.

For those who grow heirloom garlics (I fall in that category) this could be a good way to preserve backup stock, in the event the main crop is lost some year (or not replanted). It would probably take a couple years to get full-sized bulbs again from the semi-wild stock, but at least the variety would not be lost. You'd probably want to place some sort of permanent label in each clump, though, since it would be easy to forget what's what over time.

claydirt is right.
But if anyone would like some Allium vineale, I would trade you for some Allium canadense or any other onions you have.
A.v. grows wild here & can only (that I know of)be killed by pulling & crushing the bulb.
I literary have a field full of A. vineale.
I have sold some to a grower in Tenn. & heard that some people pickle it also.
It is a noxious weed, so do not let the heads manture or you will have more then you need.

What a great story, wertach.

I did grow a patch in the woods behind my neighbor's yard last fall, and I did witness it grow just fine in the spring. Now that the garlic is coming up naturally places in my own yard, it looks like those randomly planted garlic bulbs had to have been either eaten by squirrels, or somebody had to have recognized it as garlic, and harvested it.

It seems like planting garlic bulbs in random places never worked according to plan. It seems like the garlic that was planted randomly in my own property did sprout up, but they literally look like 6-10 garlics sprouting together so I could only imagine that the result would be tons of competition, and tiny bulbs in the spring.

Steve, I have garlic sprouting in my garden where I missed digging this summer. Of course, they're coming up in clumps because the bulbs were not separated (every clove seems to sprout). I've separated each clove and replanted. This has happened year after year and by separating, I get many beautiful garlic bulbs the following summer.

Steve, I have garlic sprouting in my garden where I missed digging this summer. Of course, they're coming up in clumps because the bulbs were not separated (every clove seems to sprout). I've separated each clove and replanted. This has happened year after year and by separating, I get many beautiful garlic bulbs the following summer.

I'm in Michigan...about 10 years ago I planted some garlic in my garden...I didn't harvest it....I moved my garden but kept a 3'x10' section of garden there for spices....every year the tops still come up,about 4 times thicker than the wild chives that grow all over my yard ( escapees from my first garden here) I've never harvested the garlic yet,but I snap off a top here and there while riding around mowing my 2 acres ,goes great with a beer! I didn't know when to harvest the garlic ,so after reading this I know late spring,early summer,thank you! Ron

Of the five or six kinds of garlic which one do you have, Ronnie?

"I didn't know when to harvest the garlic ,so after reading this I know late spring,early summer,thank you!"

I grow most of the hard-neck types of garlic, and they tend to be ready here in early- to mid-July. While there may be some variation year-to-year due to weather, chances are that garlic would mature close to those dates in Michigan.

I harvest my garlic when 1/3 of the blade/leaves turn brown, no mater the type.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dp5fMGNEW9I

Next to our place is a vacant acre lot where the house was removed about 10 years ago. The garlic from their garden kept spreading over those years. There was a patch about 30x70 feet and other clumps here and there. A neighbor who was related to those people told me that the garlic was German Red. I spent some time investigating. There were 9 inch or so balls of bulbs mixed in with rounds. The bulbs were small, maybe an inch in diameter. I planted some of the cloves and got bulbs as large as 3 inches in diameter the first year.

I would guess that these wilded plants will tend to grow for many years without problem because the spreading is accomplished by the bulblets bending the scapes over so that the plant can move a foot or two each year. Garlic plants grown from bulbils grow plants that are said to clear any plant diseases that would continue in plants grown from cloves.

The 30x70 foot clump was mostly to the north of a huge shade tree, with a 3 foot in diameter trunk. In the spring into early summer the only thing growing there was the garlic but then the weeds would crowd out the garlic. When the scapes were on the plants the clump was still mainly weed free. I'm guessing that the shade helped the garlic overcome weed pressure.

John,

Three inches sounds like a leek that many call elephant garlic. It will grow in small groups

in abandoned garden, until you plant it in rows & water it, then it will grow larger.

The Elephant garlic I have is from an old home stead in N.C. mountains, my B-I-L gave me some of the underground bulblets, not cloves. This EG had small brown bulblets that grow on the garlic bulb, EG is bi-annual, not annual like true garlic & has cloves the second year.

Joe - It was all German Red with the over sized bulbils. The plants that grew on the south side of the rows of garlic where much larger than the rest, due to the amount of sun; I presume. I'd have guessed that row would have been smaller because they were on the edge of the garden next to the fence. It was a shame but no one picked any scapes when they were young and tender.

I gave some thought to growing alliums in that lot because it was obvious that the over abundance of deer here made it certain that they won't eat them.

I like Georgian Fire, never grew German Red.