.
We noted that the shelves were bare of garlic yesterday.
Wife and I joked that either people had heard a late night radio show professing the benefits of garlic against the flu, or that people were hoarding against the vampire army that was coming.
Apparently the United States gets 70% of our garlic from China and we have stopped importing. I may need to plant some this year.

i use garlic on a lot of stuff i cook.

The fresh garlic we buy (Costco) is grown in the USA.

Not Gilroy California?
Home of the Stinking Rose and the Garlic festival?

News about California's lockdown probably has people hoarding garlic.

Couple days ago I was reading about the benefits of zinc for the immune system. I take an occasional Calcium, Magnesium, and Zinc supplement. Bought a couple more bottles yesterday figuring those will get cleaned out soon. If it fights flu or helps the immune system the shelves will be bare.

We plant 3-400 every fall. Lots of garlic!

Can you describe process?
Are they from seeds?
Spacing? Water?

Good grief!


How do you store it?

Buy bulbs from local store or seed catalog. That what comes from the grocery will work.

Break bulbs apart, plant individual cloves 6" or so apart in the fall (Rule of thumb, plant by Thanksgiving, harvest around solstice).

Easy stuff to grow. Can grow it right in a flower bed if that's all you have.

Geno

PS forgot to add, you can plant it in the spring too, but fall plantings get a head start. We get down to around zero F or below every year. I plant mine at least 4-6" deep and usually cover the bed with mulch after everything dies down, but it seems pretty cold tolerant anyway.

I love garlic!

No Festival this year, canceled until 2021.

Geno

we must get at least some from Ajo, AZ, right???

I raise it. Still have some from last fall left. I'll share.

If you dry it properly, it keeps a long time in a dark box. If you screw up the drying and it shows signs of sprouting, grind and freeze it.

My maternal Grandfather planted a lot of garlic. Remember his Shop/Shed being full of braids of hundreds of heads.

Ate it every day and every one of his kids and their families would get a braid of 20+ heads for Christmas every year.

Ain't nothing like it sold in stores. Even the stuff from Gilroy couldn't compare.

Old world Italian farming techniques died with him.

We must have been lazy last fall. Only 275 in the garden. Gonna be a rough year, quarantine and all.

Thanks Valsted...

Is it a spring festival? It has been years... or summer,? Tied in with the Tour De California (I assume that is cancelled too?)

Might have been a variety from the old country,

If we knew what kind we could look for it from "enthusiasts".
Worked with a guy up in Juneau we called "Garlic Joe" , he had over 50 varieties planted I think. Loads of slightly different tastes.

Stuff from Gilroy is easily beaten by fresh homegrown garlic, even using the store variety (from Gilroy??) as starters.

Hope you're enjoying the "confinement" down there.

Geno

SARS-CoV-2 came from bats. Count Dracula could take the form of a bat. Vampires, and hence bats, are repelled by garlic. Bam, instant garlic shortage. That's how it works these days.

It keeps vampires away!

Hey Geno,

Taint bad yet. Only 35 of confirmed cases and two deaths here in San Joaquin County. I believe the two deaths were directly related to one of the Cruiseship infections.

I believe he got all his plants and seeds from some of the other longtime old Italian farming families here locally.

He did however have grape vines from the old country that my Great Grandfather brought with him from Sicily.

As to a previous question you posted Stream Trout season opens last weekend April.

I noticed there wasn't any last Wednesday, when I was grocery shopping. I have a bulb and a quarter left in my pantry from before the panic shopping started. Still seems good. I've also got plenty of garlic powder, if I run out .

If you eat a lot of garlic, no need to consciously practice social distancing.

My grandfather ate a lot......claiming it helped fend off mosquitos when he was out mushroom hunting. I could smell him from 10 ft away, wind right.

I'm not a gardener of any sort, but a co-worker got me started several years ago and its so easy to grow.

Plant by late October. Plant clove sections a beer can deep and beer can apart. It'll be sprouting by late Jan easy. Snip the flower buds off when they appear. Save some of your best cloves for seed the next fall.

I eat a lot - and have never been bothered by mosquitos since I started, back when I was doing maintenance in a mobile home park.

I could stand in a freshly-disturbed mosquito swarm and not be bit once - my co-worker standing well back would get bit all over.

GOP principle. If you can't enhance the flavor and taste of the food you are preparing with Garlic, Onions and Peppers probably wasn"t fit to eat anyway. You heard it from me Magnum Bob

There is a bunch of mythical virus protections, old wives tales, floating around the web. Eating garlic is one of them. Here's a short list put out by WHO. VIRUS PREVENTION

One time my wife was out of town for a few days and I did all the cooking for my sons & I. After a few days my youngest told me "you know dad, you don't have to put garlic on everything just for me".

Easy to grow in containers too. I have some in some old containers that cattle minerals came in, and they seem to do better than the ones in the garden. miles

Ha! My folks were just down in that country. Near there anyway.

Plant several varieties of Hardneck garlic (most garlic bought in grocery stores is the Softneck variety) around mid-October here in NEPA. Music, Purple Glazer and German Red are proven favorites. Well drained soil with rows about 30 inches apart, cloves of garlic around 6 inches apart and the tip of the clove down under about 2 inches of soil. Cover with about an inch or two of straw to both prevent the cloves from being heaved out of the ground by frost during the winter and also control weeds during the growing season. Garlic is very hardy and most varieties actually need some freezing weather to do well. Posted a pic in the Image Gallery (titled, Garlic is up) back on Jan 31st. Kind of signals the coming of Spring for me.

I buy the minced stuff in the big jugs with olive oil at Sam's Club. Those will last a long time and I use it liberally. I'm good on the garlic!

Hope they had a good time Jim. Felt like this place was classed up a bit.

Geno- Joe was my Grandfathers name.

Posted pics of the garlic taken just a few minutes ago in the Image Gallery.
One of the resident Cottontails has decided to build her nest in the middle of two rows. Pic #2 is a close-up of the nest. It’s pretty easy to see her form sitting on the light colored straw at night. Hopefully, a cat will not find the nest.

I only planted about 600 bulbs last fall. 8 different varieties. I hope it's enough to get me through.

Music has been a consistent producer for me too. Probably just about the most consistent variety I plant for yield, hardiness, and taste.

I planted some last fall given to me by a friend that was labeled ajo roja. No clue where he got it but it didn't fare well in the wet cold Pennsylvania winter. It's the worst looking garlic I have. But the seed Clive's didn't impress me either.

I start every day with raw pumpkin seeds. They are loaded with zinc and since i've been doing this my prostate has been 30yrs old rather than 56.
I'm sure they help in many ways.

I just take my wife - she is a mosquito magnet - she can have a swarm around her and maybe one or two may land on me.