Time to plant garlic
If you plan to grow some garlic, October and November are the best months for planting. Be sure to buy garlic for planting from a nursery, so that you know it has been certified disease-free. Don’t wait, because nurseries often run out of it early. Plant cloves pointed-end up in well-prepared, moist soil, but don’t water until green shoots emerge. Garlic will grow in your garden all winter, then bulb up in spring, usually maturing by late June. As it matures, after you start to see the lower leaves yellowing, stop watering it. If you use drip irrigation, plant your garlic where the lines can be lifted or the water supply cut off. There are two main kinds of garlic, softneck and hardneck, each including varieties with different degrees of pungency. Softneck doesn’t flower; its stem collapses and starts to dry when the garlic is ready for harvest. Hardneck makes flower stems when it is near harvest time. In general, softneck varieties are better adapted to mild winter areas than hardneck. Local nurseries usually carry only one softneck variety. Here are some mail-order nurseries that carry a number of varieties from which you can choose:
W. Atlee Burpee & Co.: Burpee.com, (800) 888-1447
High Mowing Organic Seeds: HighMowingSeeds.com, (888) 735-4454
Nichols Garden Nursery: NicholsGardenNursery.com, (800) 422-3985 The Potato Garden: PotatoGarden.com, (877) 313-7783
Territorial Seed Company: TerritorialSeed.com, (800) 626-0866