Growing
Garlic from Bulbils
Growing
Garlic from Bulbils https://norwegiancreekfarm.ca/bulbils
Why we do
it.
Growing
garlic from bulbils is an excellent way to quickly increase the amount of
garlic that you are able to grow, but more importantly it improves the vigour
of the garlic plants and helps reduce garlic viruses in your crop. As well,
soil-borne diseases can be avoided as long as you are careful to keep the
bulbils away from the ground.
Garlic is
adaptive to it's environment, and growing from bulbils allows the garlic to
adapt more quickly to your local conditions.
How we do
it.
My preferred
method of growing garlic from bulbils is to plant in raised beds in short rows
running across the bed. Small bulbils can be crowded together, while larger
ones like an inch or so of space between them. Leave a few inches of space
between each row to facilitate weeding with a narrow hoe.
Plant the
garlic bulbils about one inch deep and
cover with soil. Sometimes we add about an inch of organic potting soil over the entire bed to help with
weed suppression. We like to plant quite heavily because during the first year
plants seem to like being crowded.
Fertilize as
required and water often, as they do not tolerate getting too dry.
Keep the
beds as weed free as you can, and they will be ready for harvest around the
same time as garlic grown from large cloves.
Harvest
and Replant
By harvest
time the plants have produced small bulbs with cloves, or more commonly single
rounds. Rounds will generally produce a bigger bulb when they are planted, but
in time they all get up to size.
We try to harvest while the plants are still
green as this facilitates getting the bulbs out of the ground. We dig up clumps
of plants and gently shake the soil out of the roots.
One
important observation - plants that have
produced a scape will have a bulb with cloves, while a plant without a scape
will produce a single round. Both kinds
are perfectly fine for planting, just make sure to separate the cloves as you
would for a full size bulb.
