by samenrahmen
Garlic Lessons
4:29 pm in Completed Window Farms, Plants, posts with pitcures!, Windowfarms Project News by samenrahmen
Garlic seemed like a bit of a challenge, and it sure provides some food for thought.
The garlic clove I posted about earlier simply stopped growing when its internal nutrient suply ran out, but still had a little surprise in store:
The clove had sat a little too deep in the rockwool, it shriveled, and when I removed the remains, mold had taken root.
As you can see, it had nevertheless developed a nice little new bulb; the roots weren’t too shabby either.
I then started with two cloves from garlic I had bought later, and which somehow already looked different.
Sure enough, they sprouted in a different way (more than one shoot) and are brighter in colour as well.
Garlic apparently is mainly cloned today, not germinated from seed, and commercial plants seem to have lost the ability to flower.
If these two (all three are organic) fail to grow beyond a certain stage as well, I’ll order some heirloom garlic which still has that ability.
I wonder if you started with heirloom garlic if you would have different results.
Carlics flower their second year in life, first year they only grow.
It’s Called Biennial.
The onions we grow in sweden can flower, but there is no point since they grow little the second year.
So we harvest the first year.
Thanks, that’s a very interesting idea. Have you tried any other bulbs or plants with chunky roots? I was thinking about trying radishes in the winter – I love to use the leaves in salads too – but I’m not so sure about how the taste of the root might be affected.
Keep it up!
I haven’t tried any other bulbous plants, no, but others have (remember that Youtube link ?).
Radishes are growing extremely quickly and the seeds are cheap, so why not give it a try ?
Right now one of the cloves seems to be bolting, last minute panic no doubt.
I’m experimenting with some very interesting creepers at the moment; should they as wonderfully well as my Pea ‘Tom Thumb’,
I’ll be more than happy.
http://growingtaste.com/vegetables/garlic.shtml