I'm not familiar with your growing region but a few weeks ago I had the same question, especially when I was seeing my neighbors garlic start to scape and a few other folks in my community garden also had scales starting to form. So I started thinking that maybe I did something wrong.

Then I go out to my plot today and surprise, I had the little scales just starting to pop up. I'm going to let them go until the have the curl but I'm glad I was patient.

I only grow the hardnecks and 2 years ago I had a few of those bulbils in the center of the stems. Other hardneck gardeners also reported the same thing so I think that it was weather/stress related. We are not commercial growers, just home gardeners. Scapes are just starting now.

If you don't get scapes, you can always eat the leaves. Garlic leaves smell awesome; the taste is mild, though.

In general, my garlic is acting differently this year. This was the first year in 8 or 9 year that all the cloves I planted didn't send up leaves before winter started. Maybe half did, or a little less. This year, that half+ didn't start to shoot up until the end of March. I have to think it's due to weather conditions, since it's never happened before. As of yesterday, no scapes, but I'm going with "this is a different kind of year."

I'm experimenting with garlic. I haven't had trouble sprouting cloves of garlic (although I haven't planted many), but the bulbils I planted last fall didn't sprout. Maybe I planted them too deeply. Because the few bulbils I planted didn't sprout, I kept the others indoors over the winter, and they grew shoots in storage. I planted them with the shoots sticking out of the ground, and now they're growing well. So, if anyone has trouble with bulbils, try keeping them in storage until they grow shoots and/or roots. Planting bulbils right away doesn't seem as easy, although if they do sprout, I imagine an earlier start is good.

[QUOTE=svalli;641013]zipcode, Does your aunt grow the ones with real scapes and the ones with the bulbils in the neck in same bed mixed with each other? She must have at least two different garlic varieties, if some have scapes and others have bulbils lower at the stem. If she has not separated the varieties at harvest time, you may have gotten a softneck bulb with hard stem in the middle due to the bulbils close to the neck.

I'm growing multiple garlic varieties and keeping the varieties separate at harvest and curing time is a lot of work.

Sari[/QUOTE]

Yes, I'm starting to think that may have been it. I probably had two mixed types, and at planting I selected the one that seemed more healthy, so I might have selected the softneck, which probably kept better.

shule1, if it was store bought garlic, it probably didn't sprout because it was treated. It happened to me with shallots. I planted normal grocery shallots, only one sprouted after a loong time, and I multiplied from there next year. It was a great shallot. I think they do this to make it last longer, not to prevent you from growing it, but who knows.

[QUOTE=zipcode;642527]…
shule1, if it was store bought garlic, it probably didn't sprout because it was treated. It happened to me with shallots. I planted normal grocery shallots, only one sprouted after a loong time, and I multiplied from there next year. It was a great shallot. I think they do this to make it last longer, not to prevent you from growing it, but who knows.[/QUOTE]

It wasn't grocery store garlic. ;) I've never seen bulbils there. The bulbils were ones I harvested myself. The original source for our garlic, which we've had for years (just letting it grow every year) was [URL="https://andrewsseed.com"]Andrews Seed[/URL], but it's an unknown variety with a little red in it, though.

It may have been too hot for them to grow in the fall when I planted them, or else the zapping I did as a precaution against disease may have stressed them for a while (quite likely; it doesn't bother seeds, but it may be different for bulbs, cuttings and plants). Whatever the case, just letting them sit in storage for a while makes sprouting them easier (since they sprout somewhat in storage).

My scapes started coming up a few days ago, but are slower to grow. They're drenched and could use a good heat wave. Er, warm wave.

shule, what do you do for 'zapping'?

I had some mites starting to get into my garlic when I harvested last year, so I tried several different treatments (although also only planted the most pristine of the lot).

I am a bit disappointed with my bulbils this spring. Two of the containers seemed to get ice dams in them over the winter (ie didn't drain well when frozen and rained on, for sure) and there's little or nothing coming up. Also disappointed to see only about 40 of the 76 rounds I planted. :?!?: Maybe the long hard winter. I guess I should be glad, I'm selecting for the toughest of the bunch. :(:)

I'm back in the garlic game after a brief hiatus when the rudbeckia took over the bed a few years
ago.
I did give it another spot but it did not do well...and i live in garlic-ville where festivals
happen every fall. Same with leeks. I get tiny pencil thin, then my neighbor dropped by
last year with giant stalks, gifting. "have any reason to want these?", well, yeah!

We had a warm Fall so it was hard to decide when to plant. Last minute i put the cloves
i had started from bulbils months before, no idea what i was doing, ...surprised to see a
good lot. (after planting i read about all the methods to aid success). Put them in my
pea/bean bed so that was probably a good call. Should see scapes this weekend.

Newfoundland might need a good mulch cover and good drainage. Though i can see some
years having trouble. I'm optimistic having a big bunch of heads tied to my door handle
last year from a neighbor. (the rest confiscated at the border...grrr) i should have peeled
it and into olive oil.

This years crop...

My scapes started poking their heads out this week as well. The garlic stalks are all nice and fat this year, so I have high hopes.

Now I just need this wet weather to move on so that I don't end up with rotting heads. I typically start harvesting at the start of July.

[QUOTE=bower;645305]shule, what do you do for 'zapping'?

I had some mites starting to get into my garlic when I harvested last year, so I tried several different treatments (although also only planted the most pristine of the lot).

I am a bit disappointed with my bulbils this spring. Two of the containers seemed to get ice dams in them over the winter (ie didn't drain well when frozen and rained on, for sure) and there's little or nothing coming up. Also disappointed to see only about 40 of the 76 rounds I planted. :?!?: Maybe the long hard winter. I guess I should be glad, I'm selecting for the toughest of the bunch. :(:)[/QUOTE]

I experimentally use a [URL="https://store.zapperguy.net/store/z4ex/"]Z4EX[/URL] with copper pipes (cheap pipes from The Home Depot; I save the nicer pipes that came with the product for other purposes, since zapping seeds/bulbs corrodes them a lot faster). I fill a quart jar less than half-way full with garlic and then add enough water to submerge them. I put the copper pipes (wires attached) in the water (and make sure they don't touch). I zap them for 15 minutes per frequency (there are 3). Then, I dry the garlic and store it in a dry place for a few months or more, and then plant.

If I'm zapping tomato or other vegetable seeds, I don't add as much water (maybe a couple inches). I just did that because I had a lot of garlic. If you add too much water, it weakens the electric current). Half full is probably weaker than two or three inches of water.

I have no idea what effect zapping would have on mites, but it seems to be potentially effective against disease (but I need more observation, still). I am growing some tomatoes that were purposefully from fruits infected with anthracnose; so, we'll see if the fruit gets anthracnose again (so far, the plants look very healthy; no spots.) But then, I am growing them in soil that had watermelons with anthracnose last year; so, if they do get it, it's not surprising (and it doesn't mean the zapping didn't remove the anthracnose). I'm mostly testing to see if they [I]don't[/I] get it (to test people's ideas on acquired immunity in plants). My hypothesis is that if a plant experiences a disease and passes it to its seeds, and if the disease is then removed from the seeds, that the new plants may have increased tolerance to it, due to acclimatization and exposure of the plant's ancestors).