Introduction: Growing Garlic in North Texas
Besides adding exquisite flavor to nearly every meal, garlic offers a host of health benefits! And North Texas gardeners will be happy to know that garlic is one of the easiest edibles you can grow in our climate. Whether you have an expansive garden or a small pot on your patio, you can grow enough garlic to meet all your needs for up to a year!
Growing Garlic with Organic Methods
In this article and accompanying video you'll learn how to grow garlic using only organic products and methods, so you can be sure your bulbs will be safe, natural, and free of toxic chemicals.
Trish begins by presenting several different types of garlic that grow well in North Texas, then walks you through our simple organic methods for preparing your planting area, setting out your cloves, and finally harvesting and drying the mature plants.
Watch the Video
Below is a transcript of the video. It has been edited for clarity and readability.
Basic Beginnings
Well, welcome to Marshall Grain. We have the perfect weather for it. I'd like to start off —first, my name is Tricia. Don't be intimidated by growing garlic because it's one of the easiest things in the world to put in your garden.
It's very simple. It replenishes itself, which is nice. So, I'm going to show you how to plant one.
Separate the Cloves
You'll purchase it as a bulb and then you'll break it into the small cloves.
Soil Makes All the Difference
The soils that you're going to use are the Fox Farm Happy Frog, the Mayer Raised Bed Mix, Back to Nature Cotton Burr Compost and the Nature's Creation Organic Garden Soil. Those are your soil options.
Depending on whether you're going to put it in the ground, or in a pot, or a raised bed, you would use one of those soils for each type of planting you're going to do. As far as your soil goes, it needs a very rich, loamy soil with a pH from 6.2 to 7. You don't need a pH test, but you can usually find them at a local hardware store. If your pH is too low, you can acidify it with compost, dried leaves, or sulfur.
Next you want to make sure that your planting area is totally weed-free. It does not like weeds. So it's very important that you keep the weeds away from it.
Plant with the Pointed End Up
Now that you've got your soil, you want to make sure that the point is up. We don't want anything blooming in China. So we want to make sure that the pointed end of the clove is facing upward so that just a hair of the point is sticking up out above the soil. You might want to mark it so you know where it is.
Types of Garlic
We have a variety of garlic types to choose from. There are basically two categories of garlics. You have soft neck and hard neck.
The California Early is a soft neck, and it it also organic. Then these varieties here are your hard necks. (For 2024 we are offering organic Music, Russian Red, Spanish Roja, and Elephant.)
They claim that a soft neck cannot be grown in the state of Texas, but it actually grows very well. So if you hear someone say that you can't grow a soft neck, you most certainly can.
Attendee: That's the only kind I've ever grown here, is the soft neck.
And the hard neck grows just beautifully.
Protect Your Plants with Mulch
Mulching is important. Again, you can use an organic wood mulch. You can also use dried leaves to mulch around it. Not exactly on top, just around it. That'll help keep your weeds down as well. You can also use straw, which is good. That's another good ground cover for mulching. As far as some of your other mulches, you can use a hardwood mulch, a cedar mulch, or a pine straw mulch.
Cedar will actually help your garlic as far as keeping your pH, because I believe that cedar has some acidity to it. Watering: It likes moist soil. It does not like to be dry, and it doesn't like to be over-watered. You want to make sure that you keep it just slightly moist.
Harvesting Your Bulbs
Now, here's the best part, is harvesting. You're going to harvest. You plant in the fall, and harvest in the spring. When you harvest it, you're going to very gently — because you're going to have a bulb now — dig it out from the ground being careful not to damage the bulb. Then, just shake the excess soil off.
Do not add any water to it at all, because you want the bulb to dry out and cure. So you need to put it in a dry, airy place for about six weeks. Then you will be able to use your garlic.
Now, the one good thing about garlic too is, you can replant from the bulb you harvested. If you want to do that, you can save a couple of bulbs or few cloves to plant next fall. This way you will have garlic year after year. It's good for three to nine months after harvest.
Pest Problems? Nope!
The only other thing I can say is that you don't have to worry about pests, because there is nothing that's going to go near your garlic.
Soft Neck Vs. Hard Neck Varieties
Attendee 1: What is the difference between the hard neck and the soft neck?
Attendee 2: The hard neck has a stem in the middle of the bulb.
Attendee 1: Other than that, does it mean anything? I mean, flavor? Does it have any other characteristics?
Hard neck varieties produce a flowering stem, known as a scape. Because of that central stock, hard neck garlic has fewer cloves per bulb. And while hard neck varieties are hardier, they can't be stored for as long as soft neck types.
Attendee 2: The soft neck is what we buy is one in the grocery stores, because it actually ships better and lasts longer. The other one is more delicate.
Okay. More information is good.
When to Harvest
The other thing that I wanted to say about harvesting is that you're going to get about five leaves that are going to come up that are green. You want to wait until at least two of those five turn a brownish color. Then you know that it's getting ready to go the opposite direction. And that's when you want to make sure you scoop it gently get it out of the ground.
You definitely don't want it to go to seed. You don't want it to bloom. When you see those five leaves come up and two are starting to turn brown, that's when you need to harvest it.
Does it matter when you plant garlic? Yes. You plant it in the fall and you harvest in the spring.
Attendee 3: Actually, I didn't know this myself, but I read that the reason you have to do it in the fall is because it needs chilling hours. It likes the cold.
How many chilling hours? I don't know, but I do know that they like the colder temperatures. And that's why you harvest in the spring, because if you let it go on into your hotter temperatures, it's just going to go to seed and it will start to rot and you'll have some real issues.
Attendee: Do we need to cover it when we have a freeze?
When you plant it, you're going to cover it with a little bit of mulch. And you can just take whatever mulch you have and put over it just to protect it if you want. Now, if we get a late frost and your leaves are starting to come up, I would definitely cover it, because you don't want any frost getting on your leaves.
And you want to plant it in full sun. They do like sun.
Attendee: Can you plant different varieties together?
Yes. You just want to make sure you space them. I think if you plant them about two inches apart that you should be fine.
The other good thing you just reminded me of is that once you harvest, if you plant another type of an allium where you planted your garlic, it will replenish your soil for your next crop in the fall. Because that garlic's going to take all your nutrients out of the soil, so you want to put it where your garlic was.
And you can save a couple of cloves for the next year. Also, you'll know where you planted your garlic last time, because you'll have something else there to remind you of where it was.
Now, I did tell my mom, she said the squirrels were digging up all her tulips. So, I told her, I said, plant your tulip bulbs and plant some garlic in front.
And that might deter the squirrels a little bit from digging up, at least until the bulbs start to pop up. So, I did recommend that to my mom. Because, I'm telling you, everything that I read, you do not have to worry about pests. They won't go near it.
Well, do I have any other questions? That's about all the information, I mean, there's, I looked up a lot of information online and they all said the same thing.
Attendee: Are the different varieties distinct enough to then discern which one it is?
No. There's only one that I would say might be a little different, would be your Russian red.
Only the elephant garlic is sold by the clove. The others are sold by the bulb.
Attendee: I just want to make sure I understand the planting depth. Do you actually just see a little tiny bit peeking out?
Yes, I would actually.
Attendee: Just a little bit down? A quarter to half an inch?
Yes, because it's going to grow down. This will actually be the neck. The clove will make its neck and then your bulb will be below that.
Conclusion
Visit Marshall Grain to get expert advice on organic gardening products and methods. We have a huge nursery stocked with locally-grown, in-season herb and vegetable starts, and Texas native plants. We also offer soils, soil amendments, mulches, organic fertilizers, organic weed controls, organic pesticides, garden seeds, and much more. We're located in Colleyville, Texas in the heart of the DFW area.