Garlic - what controls number of cloves?

General Gardening
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My this year garlic crop is very unusual. I seeded it as every year with my own seeds as I do every year. I ended up with garlic where one clove is huge and could weigh 7-10 g. But number of them in the most heads is just 4. Never had that issue before. I have to many variables to figure out - it was a new soil, it was extremely warm winter, cold spring and extremely wet summer. Does anybody know what controls not general size of the head, but number of cloves?

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Good question. I have the opposite problem- a lot of undersized cloves. But I think my situation is caused by inadequate fertilization.

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I wouldn’t claim to know what “controls” it, but I suspect the number of cloves is already built into the seed clove. That seem to be the way it works with other clumping alliums like dutch shallots and potato onions.

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I don’t think so. Why suddenly all my seeds that always had 6-7 cloves in a head downgraded to 4? Also, I found some study today - they use some chemical to increase number of cloves. But because I have no idea what this chemical is and if it occurs naturally - it doesn’t help me.

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5

Vernalization. The stress of the cold makes the cloves divide and provide more cloves.

My neighbor lost her whole crop because she planted a couple of weeks before me… the tops got green but she had mostly 1 and two clove some 3 clove garlics…all small…but lots of top growth.

I lost one variety also. but they were seed that was saved and were already forming roots and top shoots when i planted them…so the warmth made them grow nice tops but very small garlic.

Im going to plant around Veterans Day this year… unless its another Indian Summer (or global warming).

I have no idea how people grow the garlic seed that they sell at Lowes/Home Depot and Walmart/ Tractor Supply around April. Its in the bins with the onions and potatoes and strawberries.

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Thanks, that would explain. The winter was terribly warm, till February.

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In addition to heat as a factor, drought followed by too-wet weather can keep the cloves small and erratic in size. We’ve seen some of that over the last couple of years, but not to the extremes you describe. Garlic cloves develop and mature at their own pace, and the weird weather seems to confuse some of them. We’ve had huge and small sized garlics of the same variety growing side by side.

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