Blog: Why cloves need a big freeze for success…
Planting garlic in autumn is always my preferred time, usually from October to November, but this year it’s near the end of December.
I’m going through a bad time with my mother being so ill in the hospital, and I feel constantly exhausted, so excuse my lateness, but I just sneaked them in before the end of December. Garlic needs a spell of cold weather (one to two months below 10°C) to form cloves. If they don’t get this, you’ll end up with one large clove! How to grow garlic and recommended varieties.
I chose Extra Early Wight, a large white hardneck variety, with a crisp, fresh flavour.
Autumn planting garlic – cloves and scapes to look forward to
Hardnecks also produce scapes, or flowering stalks, which are quite a delicacy in France and have a mild, nutty garlic taste, so I’m looking forward to them. They’re virtually unknown in the UK and are well worth harvesting for a light summer stir fry. As the law of Sod would have it, my tardiness led to one of the two bulbs of garlic going mouldy and being completely unusable.
I’d shoved them away in the conservatory – they were fine when I bought them at the Harrogate Autumn Flower Show. Anyway, 12 cloves should make 12 bulbs, and that’s enough for a family of three, I think – and leaves more room in the 1m² raised bed for the onion sets.
I used Natural Soil Conditioner dug into the soil before planting. Rich in nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium and other trace elements, it’s broken down gradually by organisms in the soil as a long-term, slow-release fertiliser.
