I planted some of the Gardens Alive Organic Late Italian Garlic in some Grow Tubs and a raised bed at the Community Garden this past Wednesday. The Grow Tubs were 20 gallons and I planted about 20 cloves. This is pretty tight spacing, but I am always interested in trying to maximize yield in small spaces. I also planted a large number of cloves in the raised beds; probably 3” spacing. In the raised bed or garden, this will help in reducing the number of weeds. I scratched Root crops Alive on the surface and will do the same thing in the spring.
I am interested in how garlic fairs over the course of a winter in these types of containers. For the raised bed, you can see in the photo that the garlic planting is next to the AsparBest asparagus I planted last year. Those crowns/plants made it through a very harsh winter very successfully. I am actually hoping to harvest some spears next May. I think the garlic will do just fine regardless of what Mr. Frost has to throw at us, in the raised bed. The exciting test will be in the exposed Grow Tubs. If this winter is anything like last, I bet the containers will completely freeze since they will be unprotected. Will the growing garlic make it through this?
In our area of the country, garlic can be planted in early spring resulting in decent harvests in the fall. But I am from the North where we always plant garlic in the fall to harvest in the following fall. In colder climates, garlic needs that extra time in the soil to fully gain size. I believe this will maximize the size of the garlic bulbs.
Hopefully next fall I will be showing you photos of a bountiful harvest!
