ShareThisPlanting Garlic in the Pioneer Valley
Completed
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I will attempt to plant some garlic in my garden using a hybrid species from a local farmer (Delta Organic Farm). I will plant them with the cloves facing down in a newly dug portion of my garden. I will place mulch over the plants after planting, removing it in the late spring of 2010. |
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I will plant 9 cloves of garlic and then cover them with straw in my garden. I will then monitor their growth over the next few months. The experiment will be considered successful if seven of the nine cloves turn into delicious bulbs to be harvested. A side measure of success will be how good the garlic is inside some home-made pesto. |
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I will be done sometime in July/August 2010 when the garlic is ready for harvest. The experiment may end sooner if all of the planted garlic dies or fails to germinate. Once the garlic has been harvested I will measure the width of each bulb, to provide data for possible future experiments. |
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I will enjoy other garlic in the meantime and wonder about the delicious possibilities growing in my garden. |
Comments & Observations
Matthew Cornell I love it, Andrew. Homemade pesto is so good. I usually eat too much :-) I like your delicious attitude. Question: Peanuts?
Oct 28, 2009
Liza Cunningham Excellent experiment idea! I rarely think of gardening as something to try (mostly something I do poorly!). I am curious to what variables affect the outcome over the coming months. And how the quality of the final garlic compares to store-bought.
Oct 31, 2009
Andy O'Shea Thanks for the feedback. There are so many variables with gardening I am planning on taking years to try to identify what works better. And to save some time, try to pick the brains of local farmers (after I have enough experience to ask intelligent questions).
Haha, thanks for catching me on the title of this experiment, Matthew. Peanuts was actually an experiment I tried over this past summer, with poor results (due to such bad weather mostly). My brain must have gotten garbled while switching to a new gardening-related experiment.
Nov 03, 2009
Andy O'Shea Planted 10 cloves today in a fresh patch of soil, despite discovering a tree stump in the middle of the patch. Loosened the soil about 12 inches deep and then planted each bulb 3 inches deep, with the pointy side facing up, and about 4 inches apart.
There is still room for more garlic in the patch, which I didn't expect, so I might plant some more later this week if I find time.
The patch I planted in is a bit shadier than I would like, but it's the only spot available for gardening at our apartment. Last time I planted garlic, it was in an extremely sunny spot so I'm interested to see how much of an effect the shade has on the garlic.
Next step: purchase some mulch to toss over the patch and then wait a few months, while marveling at how putting pieces of plants underground can produce delicious results.
Nov 07, 2009
Matthew Cornell Good luck little fellows! Count me as another fan of "putting stuff in ground grows into something tasty to eat".
Nov 08, 2009
Liza Cunningham [Liza wrote] I want to run this experiment too (and the create a mini community so we can compare notes in the spring). Andy, the level of observation detail here is really cool to see.
Nov 11, 2009
Andy O'Shea Forgot to add this earlier, but planted two garlic cloves from the supermarket (couldn't identify the species) in the same manner on 11/14.
Nov 18, 2009
Matthew Cornell It'll be interesting to see how the mystery species compares to the known ones. How will you test that? Taste test!
Nov 23, 2009
Andy O'Shea My favorite type of test :grin:
Nov 24, 2009
Andy O'Shea Well, I had the chance to drop some mulch on the garden, but procrastination overcame me and now it's snowing. Looking forward to some warmer weather so I can sneak some cover down.
Dec 14, 2009
Andy O'Shea I actually went to the store to buy mulch, but after walking with it to the checkout counter, decided to change my plan of action. I'm going to wait to put it down until the spring, and in the meantime am using some leftover leaves to give some insulation from the cold.
Jan 03, 2010
Matthew Cornell Sounds good, Andy. I've found it's good to be flexible like this when an experiment is new.
Jan 13, 2010
Andy O'Shea I just checked and there are seven healthy looking young garlic plants in the yard. Exciting! The next step is to mulch the area once the plants get a little bigger, to make weeding easier. Also, I was surprised to see that both cloves from the supermarket garlic have sprouted. We'll see how good the garlic they produce is, though.
Mar 21, 2010
Matthew Cornell I'm also curious to hear how the taste compares to commercial. I'd be shocked if it's not better, but I'm not sure I'm willing to chew a bud of garlic as an experiment. ;-) In the garlic vein, we planted basil last year and it made a *killer* pesto. Waaay better than anything else I've had before or since. We ate a lot of it.
Mar 21, 2010
Andy O'Shea oh man, nothing beats pesto from fresh basil. This saturday I'll be planting a lot of basil to prepare for a pesto-making day later this summer.
I'm curious about the taste of the garlic too. I've found that the species of garlic you plant makes a big difference. Whichever species you find in the stores seem to be pretty bland compared to the ones I've had from local farmers.
Mar 24, 2010
Andy O'Shea Well, the results are in from the garlic experiment. 7 of the cloves sprouted, and we were able to harvest some garlic from 4 of those. And the bulbs we harvested from those four were depressingly tiny. The other three were either rotting or had bulbs so tiny it wasn't worth using them. We have yet to cook the garlic, but the scapes from the plants were delicious, so we hope the small bulbs will not disappoint. Here are some possible reasons for the lack of garlic growth:
- We waited too long to cut the garlic scapes, causing the plants to not invest enough energy into the bulbs. I don't think this is the reason because I've been to farms where they don't cut the scape and have still grown some large garlic. But, we did wait a week or two longer than we needed to for cutting these (which were delicious)
- The plants should have been harvested sooner. We left for our trip to England just as the plants should have been harvested. If we had been around, I think we would have lost fewer to rotting.
- The plants needed more sunlight. It could be that garlic needs a better spot than we have available. I strongly suspect this was a major factor in the lack of growth, as all other places I've seen garlic grow have been very sunny.
- The plants needed more weeding. We didn't put mulch down, and there were some small weeds growing around the garlic. I'm still not sure as to the affect smaller weeds have on plants in a garden, and suspect its very small, but this is a possibility.
- The plants needed more water. This was a dry summer, and we weren't always on the ball. Though the plants themselves always looked healthy, maybe we were stunting the growth of the bulb.
- The plants needed compost. In the past we've used compost when sowing a garden, but the soil here was so rich we decided to try to not use any. That could have been a mistake. None of the other plants in the garden seemed to suffer for this reason, though, so I don't think it was a large factor.
- The species of garlic we planted were bad. I was surprised the ones from the supermarket even sprouted, and they did better than the ones from the local farmer overall. But it was still a poor showing overall. Purchasing cloves online for specific species we planted in the past might yield better results.
28 days ago
Andy O'Shea Final Observation
Given my original criteria, this experiment was not a success. However, I will be trying it again next year using the lessons learned. Also, the amount of garlic harvested was so tiny, it isn't enough to attempt the side experiment of using it for pesto.
Watching the garlic grow was very exciting, especially seeing how it survived the winter. And at least we got seven scapes for cooking out of our labor.
While I am disappointed at the result of this experiment, I am still glad I attempted it. Also, my stubborn nature is driving me to try once again this fall. I'll create a new experiment for that once it starts.
28 days ago
Matthew Cornell Good work, Andy! Thanks for sharing. I wonder how my raspberry experiment might compare.
27 days ago