Dry farming garlic in Pacific Northwest

My experience is that garlic doesn't like it dry. It needs water to produce a good sized bulb. If you are farming a dry area with limited water availability you might consider drip lines with your garlic to minimize water useage.

Get 'Growing Great Garlic' by Ron Engelund. Excellent book!

-frank

Yeah, but it doesnt tell you how to dry farm garlic.

not really. Anyone who grows garlic knows enough to stop watering two weeks from harvest. If, like in my case, the garlic is interplanted with lettuce or chicory, that will help dry the ground further. The smaller heads will just be smaller.

I guess that youre too sophisticated for us.

I have done it for years here in northwest California, and it is very possible. In fact, there is no need to irrigate garlic at all in our climate because the time the Garlic needs water is during our rainy season, and the time the bulbs are drying down, June-July are ordinarily completely dry. I plant in October (I better get on it!) and harvest in July. The only problem I have are gophers, which must be trapped vigilantly if you got 'em. I hope this helps. Dan

How much precipitation do you get? Do you deep plough, or cultivate to retain soil moisture?

I get 40-50 inches of rain in an average year, and I have never had to do anything to retain soil moisture at all, although cultivation is an excellent strategy which I've used on summer crops. I don't deep cultivate because I have a deep sandy loam which garlic and gophers both seem to love.