Growing Garlic

[vegetablegarden]

Hi

I am new on here.

I love gardening and we try and grow as much as we possible can. We grow garlic and we have got terrible rust on it. We had the same problem last year. We ended up pulling the garlic early as it was so bad.

Does anyone know what to do about it?

Thanks

Beep

[David Hare-Scott]

Please tell us where you are, what the climate is like and how you grow your garlic.

David

[vegetablegarden]

hi

I live in Cornwall, and we grow it in raised beds about 2" apart.

[Bud]

How close to the sea? Garlic rust? Have to look it up. Garlic does like bone meal though. I'm not much help.

[Tony]

vegetablegarden wrote:

Vegetablegarden:

I posted this a few days ago, and it will serve here as well as my original post. Ad far as the rust - which I believe is a fungus disease

- make sure the foliage is as dry as can be by sundown - never water late in the day. If you see it, get on it immediately by dusting it with sulfur powder. Also, if possible, do not plant it where it grew before. Keep it *immaculately* weeded - garlic hates competing with weeds, and they can exacerbate the rust problem under certain circumstances, too. As to my post of the other day, it continues here:

Garlic is the easiest plant to selectively breed. The rule is simple: Plant big cloves, they make big bulbs. Plant small cloves, get very disappointing bulbs. Whether you plant garlic you buy in the supermarket (which has always worked extremely well for me) or by certified garlic stock from a seedman, get twice what you think you want to plant, and plant only the largest cloves.

In most areas of the country, garlic is best planted about a week after the first frost. It winters over, vernalizing that way, and comes up in the early spring. Those bulbs will ultimately be larger than ones planted in the early spring, but in my experience, the difference (assuming well prepared soil) is not great. Garlic doesn't need a lot of fertilizer, but it does need light, loose well-drained soil with plenty of organic matter. Though it will actually grow in shade, the more sun it gets, the better. My first year, I planted in the spring, buying the bulbs in late February, and vernalizing them in the coldest part of the refrigerator for a month. If you want to grow garlic to keep a long while (up to a year) grow softneck varieties (Silverskin, Artichoke, California Early and Late). Those are the "supermarket" garlics. Hard neck garlics are a more gourmet item, with distinctly different characteristics, but they only keep a few months, generally. When the foliage is about half died down (mid-late summer), scrape soil gently away from a plant and look at and feel the top of the garlic bulb, If it's still one smooth bulb, give it another week or ten days, and check again. If it has "cloved" (you can feel the many cloves around the perimeter) it's ready. Dig it up gently, and store them in a dark, dry place for 3-4 weeks to cure completely. A box frame with a screen bottom or a mesh onion bag is ideal for this. Then braid or trim the leaves and cut off the roots. Always save however many bulbs you need to be next years seed stock, and save the biggest ones (that's the selective breeding angle).

My first year, I bought my seed stock from the bulk garlic bin for $1.00. That was the last time I bought garlic. Nature has suppied me since. Quite a return on an initial investment!

Tony M.

[Bud]

Following up me own post, I looked on Wikiapedia. And it is a fungus, sulfur powder might do the trick or a fugicide with azoxystrobin in the label. It is safe except to fish and easily broken down in the soil causes no harm to earthworms.

Companion plants:Clover, Chive, Leek , Nasturtium , Southernwood, Daffodils. You can find that all on Wikiapedia

[Bill who putters]

Pretty flowers. I prefer red for hummers that taste like pepper.

[David Hare-Scott]

It doesn't look like there is much meat on them. Do you eat them on skewers or spatchcocked like quail?

David

[vegetablegarden]

Thanks for the garlic tips. When we had dry weather we watered it in the evening - that's obviously why we have the rust. We learn something every day.