How to grow garlic

Garlic is a fall-planted bulb crop that overwinters in the ground and matures the following summer, occupying a bed from autumn through early summer. Each clove develops into a full head of tightly sheathed cloves by late June to late July. Gardeners grow it for its culinary depth and for a shelf life, after curing, that can stretch well into winter. Hardneck types also produce a flowering stalk called a scape in late spring, adding a second edible harvest before the bulb matures.

The hardest part of growing garlic well is nitrogen timing. University of Minnesota Extension warns that applying nitrogen after the first week in May can delay bulbing. A second-year gardener who has learned to fertilize generously will often apply a spring top-dress on a vegetable-garden schedule, not realizing the deadline has already passed. The resulting bulbs stay soft and undersized; because cloves that have not filled their skins lack the wrapper integrity to cure properly, the crop fails at storage even before it reaches the kitchen.