What's going on with this garlic?

[Christine]

I planted Thermidrome and the remarkably expensive Iberian Wight last year - very deep, which meant they came up after the cold snap and they've grown on beautifully

The foliage is just starting to yellow at the tips, but hardly at all and some of each variety have started to produce knobbly bits above the neck that look remarkably like flower buds. They taste incredibly garlicky, too
I pulled those that had thickened and left the others. What should I have done?

I've scoured my many allotment books - (it's like having a cat, suddenly everyone knows what to get you for Christmas, and there have been 5 of those so far) but no mention of this that I can discover

It's been dry for weeks, and I guess they've been thoroughly watered only three or four times by me or the occasional rain...

garlic showing bulb and mystery swelling

garlic pic.JPG (13.1 KiB) Viewed 5197 times

By the way, my Pakistani neighbour has planted the patch of front 'garden' that we have in front of our terrace houses with many, many garlic bulbs, interspersed with coriander (and weeds, and burst open tea bags that are presumably for mulch). She harvests a leaf from each garlic when she's ready to cook and has now cut all the foliage off the lot and left the bulbs - presumably to ripen. She have me a bundle of the leaves and they are wonderful cooking herbs, really the scent of Indian cooking (sorry, Pakistani!) Now if only we had a common language...

[bean gardenin']

Be interested to see any replies as this is exactly ehat has happened to mine!

[Millymollymandy]

Ooooh that looks interesting and you get double the crop!

[Millymollymandy]

Is it something to do with being planted so deep? I thought garlic was alwas planted shallowly just like onions, least that's what I've read and what I do. It looks like the 2nd head of garlic formed at ground level like it was trying to develop like ones planted just under the soil surface.

[Odsox]

I seem to remember a thread here last year on this same subject and when Odsox comes along I know he has a complete explanation

No Susie, I think that was something different. I seem to remember that was garlic or leeks producing flower heads with little "bulbils" instead of (or as well as) flowers. The explanation for that is when the flower head falls over, it plants it's offspring about 18 inches away (the length of the stem) so that they don't compete.

I think MMM has the answer, it looks like you planted them far too deep Christine and the plant is compensating and growing a bulb at the surface where it should be. AFAIK, garlic like onion sets should be just pressed into the soil with their necks just exposed, at least that's what I've always done, plus it allows the sun to ripen the bulbs to store better ... both garlic and onions.
But at least you haven't wasted a crop, you've just got 2 small bulbs per plant instead of one larger one.

[Christine]

I wondered about that, but they've come above the surface - variously one or two inches. My books say plant up to 4 inches deep in dodgy conditions, so I added a couple of inches to make sure!
I'm attaching a close-up. I haven't grown garlic before, so I'm not sure what a flower bud looks like.

I only photographed a smaller one - one or two that have behaved like this are serious bruisers, though the one I pulled to act as a comparison is larger it is also one of the Iberian Wight, which are supposed to be bigger anyway! If any more develop, I'll leave one to see what happens.

Odsox - when garlic does the thing about tipping over to grow its bulbils further away - is it worth leaving them to do this, or are they like onion seeds and a waste of time?

[grahamhobbs]

I usually plant my garlic 2" deep and have no problems. I've never seen anything like this.

Allowing the seed heads to topple over is a bit of a waste of time because usually better to propagate from the cloves. But can be useful for leeks.

[Odsox]

Have you cut one of those things open ?
It would be interesting to know if there's an embryo flower head inside or a regular garlic clove.

As to allowing them to self seed, I agree with Graham, far better to plant cloves again. Usually you keep one bulb back to plant for next years crop, but until you understand what's going on with them I'm not so sure that's a good idea.

[Christine]

Cut it open? I've eaten it! I think they are bulbils, despite the slight green tip to the top and their position on the stem. They look just like cloves inside and taste like cloves but are more tender than the cloves I'm used to buying (which I suspect is to do with the drying off they get to store).

Earlier in the thread, 'bean gardenin' says the same thing has happened to theirs, so it isn't unique. I wonder what depth they planted?

I do wonder now whether this is to do with that long cold dry period, followed by heat, as almost all of an allotment neighbours' overwintering onions - though he is much better at consistent watering than I am - have shot up flower heads.

I'll choose one of the ones that hasn't behaved like this to replant - about one fifth of the thirty or so are like this and the rest are currently behaving as expected. I think you store the bulb until autumn?

[bean gardenin']

I didn't plant them very deep and my "bulbils" are about 6 inches above the ground. My Garlic are also very small but I wonder whether that is because the patch is a bit too weedy . I read yesterday that garlic and onions don't do very well against weeds.

[Christine]

What varieties were they? Same as mine: Thermidrome and Iberian Wight?
No significant weeds between the garlic - though there is an infestation of self-seeded Russian kale, which would probably do the same job. The garlics' stout stems have done a good protection job against the pigeons, though, so I'll be able to transplant them when I pull the rest of the garlic and have them for winter.

[grahamhobbs]

Having said I've never seen this before - what did I find this weekend but some of my Thermidrome garlic had started doing the same thing. No other varieties were affected, I grew 4 other types, but these were all planted in Autumn. The Thermidrome was planted in spring, a little bit late (saw it going cheap and thought I'd give it a try). All were planted about 2" deep. The Thermidrome probably didn't get much watering.

So is it happening to this one variety, Thermidrome, or to other varieties as well?

[bean gardenin']

Embarassed to say that i don't remember what variety I planted, last November seems so long ago!

[Christine]

One of the Iberian Wight went quicker than the Thermidrome - but only one (so far). There were 6(ish) of the Thermidrome, so three times as many pro rata

[Daveswife]

My understanding of garlic growing is that the best time to plant is October or November and plant about 2" or 3" deep but no deeper because you want them to benefit from really hard frosts. They love a long spell of freezing cold weather during which time they go completely dormant. Then when spring comes they burst into wakefullness and make a proper head of garlic which will be ready to pick the following July/August. Well, that's the theory.

If I were to make a guess what has happened to yours I would say they were planted too deep. But as long as you have something garlicy to use then whatever shape they come out it is useful.