when do you harvest garlic?

[Norma J. Briggs]

I know this is a silly question for the old timers, but...I live in zone 9 and planted mine (the garlic) in the fall since we have very warm winters-never even a light freeze-now I have no idea when I should harvest it.

Are there signs I look for when it is ready?

Thanks

Norma

[omi]

In our version of zone 9 (AZ Desert), the best time is when there are still about three green leaf blades on the plant. Each leaf blade represents a wrapper around the bulb and if you wait until all of the leaves turn brown there is nothing to hold the blades together. In our region, this usually happens in May for true garlic (early June for elephant garlic) if the cloves (or rounds) are planted in October. Olin

[Loki]

il Sat, 06 Mar 2004 00:22:18 GMT, "Norma J. Briggs" ha scritto:

The tops go brown :-) . if you leave them in too long, like over winter, much of them will turn to slush.

[Norma J. Briggs]

[Steve Calvin]

I "assume" that you know to cut the scapes off.

I harvest mine when the majority of the leaves are brown. I clean them off and hang them upside down in a cool dry place with good ventilation for a week or two and then cut the stems off and store.

Typically in New York zone 5 a/b (Mid-Hudson Valley) that's in late June or early July. I have no clue when it would be for zone 9