Normally the way I plant garlic is this: I put the cloves in the ground in late September. It stays in the ground over winter and is the first thing that pops up out of the ground in the spring. It then grows until July when I dig it up and dry it. Then in late September I take some of those dried garlic, plant it, and the whole process begins again.
Last year I didn’t have a huge crop of garlic and so didn’t have enough to plant, but I still had a lot of dried garlic from the year before that still seemed firm and viable, so I planted half fresh garlic and half year old garlic. I wasn’t sure if the old ones would grow or not, but I gambled.
Last fall shortly after I planted it, the old garlic, happy to be given a chance to grow, shot out of the ground. Usually after planting, you don’t see the garlic until spring. When winter hit that old garlic that had sprouted, disappeared under the snow. When the snow melted it was still there and green, ready to continue growing. The new garlic also popped out of the ground ready to grow.
The photo shows the old green garlic in the background and the new young sprouts in the foreground. It won’t be until July when I dig it all that I really find out how the two compare.
You can view my paintings at: www.davidmarchant.ca
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