Garlic seeds are very valuable as well if your planning to make new varieties. They do take several years to make bulbs. It’s easy to grow several thousand seeds even from a small patch so for some it’s a cheaper way to get bigger if you have patience.
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It depends on the type of garlic. For Rocamboles, it takes two years to grow close to full size garlic. But for Porcelain, it takes 4-5 years to grow to decent size garlic from bulbils. And often time the young plants get lost to the weeds.
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Ok…so here is my first pulling…more out there, but you can see all the small ones…these were all from the little bulblets i just threw everywhere. Not something i’ll do again because its annoying dealing with such small bulbs. I had so much garlic last year that i didn’t plant much for this year.
Looking at it…the larger bulbs were probably planted by me from bulbs…maybe…i don’t remember.
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Looks like plenty to me. I could never eat that much in a year. What time of the year do you plant yours Rob. I tried planting some in May. I think it was to late plus the garlic I bought was pretty dry. I should have hydrated it before planting. I have a couple growing but they are small, and the chipmunks keep digging them up! I might try some in containers next year. I have four rain gutter grow systems , or forty foot worth of buckets on gutters that I just set up the last couple of weeks. I’m adding two more. I really like them. Some are up in the air so rabbits and deer can’t get them. Two are on my deck by my pool. A ten foot gutter holds ten five gallon buckets. Once planted you never have to water. They grow better like that two.
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I still have a giant stack from last year… I’m going to give a lot of the stuff this year away.
Oh…washing, cutting off roots is time consuming. My legs were numb when i was done.
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When did you pull the garlic? You should not wash it after you pull it out and cut any leaves or roots. You have to dry it completely, until leaves are dry and yellow, at least a month. Then you can cut the roots and the tops, and remove some loose top skin. This way it will store for months.
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There is nothing wrong with the baby garlic. That is how I grow my garlic stock from very beginning. Below are my this year’s harvest:
Below are so-called “rounds”:
I grow the large rounds, bigger than 1/2", as regular garlic cloves in fall. Then I grow the tiny ones as bulbils in spring. The tiny ones should grow into larger rounds for next year’s planting. I do this again and again and it has worked well for me to multiple my stocks rather quickly.
Of course it takes some time, but it is not very hard. Just need to harvest the young plants early since they will fall when they are ready. No scapes.
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I’ve always cleaned it right away… I do things my own way 
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To me that is a very helpful post, thank you. That exact thing happened to my garlic this year. Last weekend I decided to pull the plants. I harvested only small and round bulbs and wondered why. I’m new to growing garlic. This was my first season. In spring I ordered some plants cause I was too late to get bulbs and propagate the plants myself, plus I wanted to grow specific varieties.
I probably got plants from bulbils I think. I will replant them in fall and hopefully harvest some bigger bulbs next year.
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In spring I ordered some plants cause I was too late to get bulbs and propagate the plants myself, plus I wanted to grow specific varieties.
In spring, you are already late. Also, you ordered plants, and you have no idea how the plants were started, from what seed garlic. Some sellers can just start some sprouted supermarket garlic and sell the plants. I do not recommend buying plants at all. You need to know the source of the seed garlic.
When garlic does not have enough time to grow or mature, the hot weather tells the plants to propagate. So the plants rush to produce small rounds. This is how garlic survive in the wild.
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Yes, I was late. I believe I got the varieties ordered. They look different and the nursery I ordered from is specialized in heirloom varieties. They also have a good reputation. The ordered varieties are not rare or heirloom, I got German Hardy, German Red, Spanish Rojo and Silver Rose.
I am going to replant the bulbs in September and hope for a better crop next year.
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I used to think that way so each year I planted a little less (I plant cloves in Oct, harvest in June). Then I figured out how to can it (shredded through a food processor so it looks like what you buy in jars in the produce section). Then I tried dehydrating it and turning it into a powder. THEN I wasn’t planting enough. 
Some folks might think that processing all that garlic is a lot of work, but this cheap and handy gadget makes it easy and quick.
(pencil is for scale) The little nubs on the inside rub the scales off and out pops a cleaned clove.
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I enjoy growing more than consuming. We still receive cold shoulder when socializing after consuming garlic, even garlic powder.
In fall of 2015 I planted some bulbils. I started pulling some up today, their second year. Many were nice size rounds. Some were heads with small cloves. Some had multiplied. One had multiplied into 8 rounds (individual plants). All that from my plants that produced 40 or more bulbils each.
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You should dig up every year. The one you did not dig up last summer did not get optimal growing conditions.
It is very similar to growing daffodils. If you let cultivated garlic to grow wild, eventually they will dis-integrated into tiny wild garlic. Then they will get lost. You’ll never see any 2-3" garlic bulbs any more.
I agree. Everything will be dug up this year and mostly large cloves will be replanted. Some small ones will be replanted to get some extra scapes for pesto and stir fry.
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You probably won’t get any scapes with the small cloves.
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My garlic died back early this year and the bulbs are smaller than usual. The only variety still in the ground is Music. We had odd weather and that was most likely the problem. I noticed one commercial website has very limited hardneck garlic this year because of their weather related poor crop. Considering all the problems growing food crops, if the only problem with garlic is small or large bulbs I’m lucky.
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I’m growing Music and German white but the garlic I would not hesitate to leave in the ground is elephant or old fashioned pioneer garlic Dividing Garlic clumps. I got my semi wild garlic aka pioneer garlic aka Indian garlic from my grandfather about 25 years ago and the bulbs are not huge but we do enjoy growing it. He collected the seeds and used those in his cooking. Some people might laugh but he pealed the seeds and harvested 10+ old large oatmeal containers full per year of seeds. The garlic he grew has the best flavor! Music, German white, and elephant garlic taste like a regular onion in comparison. It’s the difference between wild and tame strawberry taste. My grandfather would never consider harvesting bulbs as he considered it to much work and wasting his plants. Everything he did he saved the largest most flavorful of whatever and did all breeding from that. I’ve learned it that way and improved many varieties of plants but ofcourse every variety you improve you will have 100-1000 rejects to eat.
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clarkinks, this is very interesting. I think tasting garlic is even harder than tasting wines. The difference is still subtle. Over the years, I tasted different kinds of wines and know about the distinct flavors of some of the wines. But it is still hard to tell with most of them.
Tasting garlic is just harder. First, we do not have access to many kinds of garlic we like to taste. We just do not find 50 varieties like wines on the shelf. Then, garlic is perishable and flavors change with the aging. The last, we have to taste the garlic raw to tell the difference. It is just more enjoyable to drink wine than eat fresh garlic with main meal…
But garlic seems to be my main focus now since we can’t practically grow anything with my severe rabbit pressure. Rabbit just eats almost everything, even worse than deer.
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