Kitchen Garden Forum

Hi Deb,

Don't worry about your Solent wight, as it's not due to be harvested till July. The Early Purple comes ready in May, Albigensian and Iberian in June. So my Iberian leaves look pretty rusty now, but the Solent Wight, Elephant garlic and Printanor [from cloves saved from a previous order from the O.G. catalogue] are still green.
The books seem to suggest it's better to dig up too early than too late, as the bulbs rot if left too long. Certainly my Thermidrome didn't do at all well the last two years, but I dug it up in May this year and it looks smashing.
Thanks Colin for your tips. I think a lot of ash dug into the soil before planting is also helpful.

Mike V

Garlic Guy, I've never been to the garlic farms on the IoW, too busy on the allotment at the right time!

Can someone please explain the difference between "hardneck" and "softneck" garlic? I've got some good-sized bulbs in the garden (bought last autumn from a garden centre and planted in October)which seem ready to harvest now, but I have no idea what "neck" they are. Is it important? I can't remember what variety it is.
Thanks, Lyn.

This link may help to explain the difference:
http://www.garlic-central.com/varieties.html

Thanks for that, Deb.
Cheers, Lyn.

harvested my first garlic yesterday and hung them up in the polytunnel to dry out - I'm planning to leave them in there for a week before storing them in a dark place (shed, basically!). Does this sound like I'm doing the right thing?

Hi BP,
I would suggest to you that a shed is far too hot for storage and you try and find somewhere really cool for storage. Not easy I know but I have a back porch that faces north and I hang mine that are to be used fairly soon in there and the rest go into my storage facility in the barn. I do not expect that you have a barn but a Garage would be certainly better than a shed.

Thanks Johnboy
actually the shed is brick built, windowless and in shade for most of the day so I thought it would be ok, maybe I'm wrong... just on the hanging in the polytunnel bit, is this the right thing to do?

Hi BP,
It reminds me of the maker of Brick Built Cazies!!
(Spelling alternative!!)
Not the normal shed then! It should be fine in there. As for drying it would be better out of direct sunshine and as low down as possible. It will not take very long in the tunnel to be dry enough to plait and then store.

The first lot I harvested about 5-6 weeks ago were normal sized and had a faint pleasant garlicy smell.

The ones I harvested in the last 3 weeks have had the most powerful garlic smell I've every come across. I had to store them indoors the day after picking (big downpours) and the family accused be of opening a Greek Houmous factory. Even the Guinea Pig was at his wits end!

They've been ouside ever since, but are still pungently powerful.

Has it just been a good year for garlic or do you think it's down to different varieties (the two harvests cover 3 different strains)? Has anyone else noticed this?

Yes, my Iberian Wight was hung in our spare bedroom and we felt we just had to takeit out of there before our visitor came. I don't know whether this would have been the case if it had been one of the earlier varieties; I'll try hanging them there next year to see if I get the same effect. But the Elephant garlic [supposedly "mild"] would have had the whole family abandoning the place, so it's a good thing I stored it in my shed!

mike