Question for Garlic Mavens

[Derald]

I copied the following text from a garlic cultist's web site. The author grows garlic in Texas:

>When your soil is fully ready to be planted, take the bulbs you want to > plant and break them apart into their individual cloves (Being sure to > keep each variety separate from others. Soak each varieties' cloves in > water containing one heaping tablespoon of bicarbonate of soda (baking > soda) and liquid seaweed per gallon to protect them from fungus as well > as give them an energy boost. Leave the cloves in the soda water > overnight for 16 to 24 hours or long enough for the clove covers to > loosen so the liquid comes into contact with the surfaces of the cloves > and the clove covers loosen up so that the cloves can easily be > extracted without damaging them. >Garlic's clove covers can contain fungal spores, or conidia or the eggs of pests > such as mites and are best discarded rather than planted since the > first thing the cloves do is to shed them, anyway. The baking soda > helps neutralize the fungi. Commercial growers don't usually have time > to peel cloves bare but they need to find an economical way to do it > because garlic diseases or pests can put them out of business. > Gardeners have the time and and should peel the clove covers off. >The cloves should then be soaked in rubbing alcohol or 100 proof vodka for three > or four minutes and then planted immediately. The alcohol kills mites > and other pests and any pathogens the first soaking missed. I'm not > sure if the alcohol soaking kills mite eggs or not but removing the > clove covers and swishing the bare cloves around vigorously in alcohol > will likely remove most of them. Every time I have done this, the > treated garlic turned out better than the untreated control group. > Alcohols are on the National Organic Program accepted list and baking > soda is accepted under part 205.605. This may seem a little draconian, > but many pathogens that affect garlic present few or no symptoms until > it is too late, and the soaking eliminates most problems before they > develop.

My question is: "Do you actually do all of this stuff"?

[David Hare-Scott]

No. And I don't have any problems. My rate of sprouting and growing to maturity is probably over 95% of cloves planted. A commercial grower who has the same crop in the same ground year after year is bound to have more potential for pests and disease, if you don't do that you are way in front.

David

[songbird]

Derald wrote: ...

no.

rotational planting and growing hardy cultivars avoids a ton of problems.

songbird

[Ecnerwal]

Heaven Forfend. No way in Hades. I have no idea if that sort of thing is really needed in Hades (which, from 43?N closely resembles Texas, or vice versa) but one of the best things about growing garlic is that it's about as close to trouble-free with no fuss as plants come.

I stuff it in the ground in fall (not as late as some would have you do it - having missed a year and had it all sit in the ground to be followed by the best harvest in memory, I am unconvinced that it minds having leaves out in the winter), mulch/weed a bit, and harvest it. If a variety does not do well enough to make its own seed, it's out of my crop. I will, quite rarely (many years go by without doing so), buy a pound or so of seed garlic to try a different variety. If it wants to be around next year it had better make 2-3 lbs of seed-quality heads, and enough left over to eat some. I build up to whatever seems like a level I want to sustain.