Hi Songbird,

If I like the Trader Joe's garlic I just planted,
I was thinking of letting a few go to seed.

They are right next to my green onions. Will the
cross pollinate? They are similar families.

If they turn out to be soft neck, will they flower
and seed?

Does garlic take two years to bulb up from seed?

-T

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T wrote:

Hi Songbird,

If I like the Trader Joe's garlic I just planted,
I was thinking of letting a few go to seed.

They are right next to my green onions. Will the
cross pollinate? They are similar families.

If they turn out to be soft neck, will they flower
and seed?

Does garlic take two years to bulb up from seed?

from seed three or more years, but of course
depending upon variety and if there are even seeds
available as many garlics now do not get seeds at
all. it's possible to find some garlics that will
bloom and get seeds but you'll have to look for them
and even if they do bloom and you do get seeds they're
not normally a very high rate of germination. it's
something talked about in places.

even from a large scape it will take several years
to get a decent sized bulb from some garlics. even
when i plant a large scape (which is huge in comparison
to a seed in terms of starting energy) the first year i
may get a single (an undifferentiated clove) or a tiny
bulb with small cloves if i were to dig it up again and
check it out. most the time i'm not planting scapes
any longer (i try to give them away to people who want
them and otherwise i chop them up and use them as worm
food or bury them deeply in a garden because i don't
really need any more garlic growing around here :) ).

i get large bulbs (3-5 inches in diameter) because
i plant large cloves to begin with. the small cloves
we eat.


songbird

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On 6/10/21 6:08 PM, songbird wrote:

i get large bulbs (3-5 inches in diameter) because
i plant large cloves to begin with. the small cloves
we eat.

I planted thumb size cloves last fall and got cherry
sized bulbs this year.

https://www.burpee.com/vegetables/garlic/fall-garlic/garlic-chesnok-red-69054T.html

Note: died last week in May

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T wrote:

On 6/10/21 6:08 PM, songbird wrote:

i get large bulbs (3-5 inches in diameter) because
i plant large cloves to begin with. the small cloves
we eat.

I planted thumb size cloves last fall and got cherry
sized bulbs this year.

https://www.burpee.com/vegetables/garlic/fall-garlic/garlic-chesnok-red-69054T.html

i didn't see anything about it being particularly winter
hardy, nor did i see anything about it being tolerant of
arid climate or poorer soils. not sure how it was treated
so i can't say much else.

Note: died last week in May

did you inspect the plant remains?

so it survived or didn't it?


songbird

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On 6/11/21 4:26 AM, songbird wrote:

T wrote:

On 6/10/21 6:08 PM, songbird wrote:

i get large bulbs (3-5 inches in diameter) because
i plant large cloves to begin with. the small cloves
we eat.

I planted thumb size cloves last fall and got cherry
sized bulbs this year.

https://www.burpee.com/vegetables/garlic/fall-garlic/garlic-chesnok-red-69054T.html

i didn't see anything about it being particularly winter
hardy, nor did i see anything about it being tolerant of
arid climate or poorer soils. not sure how it was treated
so i can't say much else.

That came from private correspondences with Burpee.
They actually test bedded those guys in zone 6B, same
as mine. It was the one they specifically called
out for me. And they knew around were I lived too:
arid and all. And I kept them water all winter long,
being careful not to over water. They over wintered
perfectly.

Note: died last week in May

did you inspect the plant remains?

so it survived or didn't it?

The plants grew only about 8 inches all. They
never scaped. They entire tops died off down to
the ground. I had to dig out the whole bed to
find the bulbs (and probably missed several) as
the tops were starting to blow away in the wind.
The bulbs ranged in size between a marble and
a cherry.

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On Thursday, June 10, 2021 at 7:42:48 PM UTC-4, T wrote:

Hi Songbird,

If I like the Trader Joe's garlic I just planted,
I was thinking of letting a few go to seed.

They are right next to my green onions. Will the
cross pollinate? They are similar families.

If they turn out to be soft neck, will they flower
and seed?

Does garlic take two years to bulb up from seed?

-T

A garlic-flavored onion might have some commercial possibilities with the fine dining set.

Paul

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Pavel314 wrote:
...

A garlic-flavored onion might have some commercial possibilities with the fine dining set.

in some cuisines green garlic is a thing. :)

when harvested and eaten fairly raw it does taste like onion
and garlic. when cooked the garlic flavor is less garlicky.

i wish i had time to dig mine up and eat it but i have one last
large garden to plant, weeding and mowing to keep me busy for the
next few days.

yesterday i finished planting:

https://www.anthive.com/img/n_garden/thm/DSC_20210611_132537-0400_951_N_Garden_Planted_thm.jpg

gladly we got some sorely needed rain yesterday evening so that
is a huge relief and frees up about an hour and a half of my time
this morning. it was getting way too dry out there.


songbird

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T wrote:

On 6/11/21 4:26 AM, songbird wrote:

T wrote:

On 6/10/21 6:08 PM, songbird wrote:

i get large bulbs (3-5 inches in diameter) because
i plant large cloves to begin with. the small cloves
we eat.

I planted thumb size cloves last fall and got cherry
sized bulbs this year.

https://www.burpee.com/vegetables/garlic/fall-garlic/garlic-chesnok-red-69054T.html

i didn't see anything about it being particularly winter
hardy, nor did i see anything about it being tolerant of
arid climate or poorer soils. not sure how it was treated
so i can't say much else.

That came from private correspondences with Burpee.
They actually test bedded those guys in zone 6B, same
as mine. It was the one they specifically called
out for me. And they knew around were I lived too:
arid and all. And I kept them water all winter long,
being careful not to over water. They over wintered
perfectly.

ok. the size of the resulting bulb is going to be
determined by the most active part of the growing
season in the spring following winter (in a freezing
environment where the plant is mostly dormant).

the variety, quality of the soil, spacing of the
plants, moisture during the growing season, amount of
sunlight and weed competition are the major factors
in bulb size. since i plant in pretty good soil here
that has been amended with worm castings and organic
material i do not usually fertilze the plants while
they are growing and get excellent results.

often people put plants too close together and that
does make a big difference in bulb size. if i put
my garlic 6 inches apart that is too close. at least
8 inches or more helps get larger bulbs.

Note: died last week in May

did you inspect the plant remains?

so it survived or didn't it?

The plants grew only about 8 inches all. They
never scaped. They entire tops died off down to
the ground. I had to dig out the whole bed to
find the bulbs (and probably missed several) as
the tops were starting to blow away in the wind.
The bulbs ranged in size between a marble and
a cherry.

oh, ok, so it did survive, so the above sentence
should have read "died back" instead of "died". :)


songbird

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On 6/12/21 4:30 AM, songbird wrote:

often people put plants too close together and that
does make a big difference in bulb size. if i put
my garlic 6 inches apart that is too close. at least
8 inches or more helps get larger bulbs.

They were six inches apart

They died about two weeks after it got warm

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T wrote:
...

They died about two weeks after it got warm

they didn't die, they went dormant. ;)


songbird

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On 6/12/21 6:28 PM, songbird wrote:

T wrote:
...

They died about two weeks after it got warm

they didn't die, they went dormant. ;)

songbird

Dormant. Mumble. Mumble.

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