Last fall I was talked into growing some garlic for sale. I chose Elephant Garlic which is really a leek, not a true garlic. I bought 20 pounds of seed stock, planted the cloves in raised rows, mulched with straw and waited for winter. In the spring, I carefully raked off the straw when I saw sprouts coming up. By July it looked like this. The first 2 rows are Elephant Garlic, the next is a regular garlic, with onions beyond them.

One third of the crop ready to be tied into bundles of 5 and hung in the garden shed to dry for a month.

Regular garlic on the left, elephant garlic on the right. It's important to keep the sun off the garlic while it dries. A small fan kept the air moving, and the door was opened in the daytime to keep the garlic from cooking.

A 13 oz clump of elephant garlic. Many were this big.

I saved 25# to plant for my crop next year, and sold about half the crop of elephant garlic and made enough money to pay myself back for the original seed stock, with enough left over to buy some new varieties.

You might have noticed little brown things on the bottom of the clumps in picture 3. Those can be planted and grown into a round (like an onion), stored for winter and replanted the second year to form a clump. I have a coffee can about 2/3 full of them. If nothing else, it may keep the gophers from eating so many of the rest of them.

Very nice, Mary! We grow garlic every year and love it. I ordered from Filaree Farms last year and was happy. Where did you get your bulbs?

My elephant garlic came from Peaceful Valley Farm and Garden Supply, Grass Valley, CA www.GrowOrganic.com The new varieties I ordered for this year are from Territorial Seed www.territorialseed.com

Wow, Mary! That is quite a haul!

Awesome Mary!
Now next years sales will be all profit. Not bad, not bad at all.

Thanks Mary!

My neighbor who got me started growing garlic, has his website up now, so that he can sell seed garlic online. He has 4 varieties offered at this time, but will be adding to it as he builds his seed stock supply. He will be adding shallots to it next year. www.marvelousroots.com

thank you

Here is a fantastic, big and wonderful website for all kinds of garlic information, plus links to a network of growers offering a very wide selection of varieties. If you want to know almost anything about garlic, this site probably has it. www.gourmetgarlicgardens.com

Great sites! Thanks for sharing!

I am sorry for the delay in replying, MaryE, but I just got back from ten days in Ireland and then was away three days for an out-of-town football game. Anyway, in answer to your question, I have ordered garlic bulbs from several suppliers. One is Garmet Garlic Gardens (Texas), another is Afternoon Zephyr Farm (Oregon), and the last order just received, and planted today, was from Forever Yong Farm (I think Arizona).

I have just planted my cloves in a raised bed (and a few dozen cloves in large, deep pots). I planted approximatly 150-200 cloves and perhaps 12-15 varieties. Being in NE Mississippi, I order Creole varieties and varieties that grow well in warm weather. The creole varities are really special, maintaining good zest after cooking, and are generally more expensive than other varieties.

My wife and I love garlic and cook with it regularly. There is nothing quite like the "gourmet" varieties when compared to grocery store garlic. I never knew why the stores put the elephant bulb in a mesh bag. You enlighted me and that makes perfectly good sense for them to do so.

If you have interest, I will be glad to list the varieties I just planted. Ken

Holy cow. 2000 pounds of garlic! I cannot even imagine growing that much and then having to hang it to dry and ultimately market it. I am hoping to harvest 40-50 lbs but don't have a clue whether I will be able to sell even that much.

Ireland was absolutely amazing. I have traveled most of Europe and have never seen an area quite like it. My wife and I are 1/2 Irish, so it was neat to see our "native" country. My mom, sister, brother, and now wife are all red-heads. I got my blond (now gray) hair from Dad.

Here is one of the pics my wife took while on a nature walk. It shows the rear of one of the castle hotels we stayed in. The next pic is the view outside the window while having breakfast and the final two pics are of some gorgeous Hydrangeas, colors of which I have never seen before.

drdawg said: If you have interest, I will be glad to list the varieties I just planted. Ken

I'm definitely interested.

Hey, Dave. Yesterday I planted approximately 12-18 cloves of the following varieties:

Applegate Giant, Early Red Italian, Ajo Rojo (Creole), Red Toch, Rogue River Red, Blanco Piancenza (softneck), Shilla (turban), Labera Purple (Creole), Native Creole, Maiskij (turban), Spanish Benitee (Creole), and Translvanian.

My first try at growing garlic was the fall of 2011, and I planted Applegate Giant, Early Red Italian, Red Toch, Rogue River Red, Native Creole, and Translvanian. All grew well and the average harvested bulb for each was around 1/4 lb.

Here in New Orleans, I planted my garlic about 2 weeks ago. I had purchased a warm winter assortment from Gourmet Garlic. I checked on them this morning & several have little green shoots coming up!

The assortment I received included Early Red Italian, Applegate Giant, Inchelium Red, Rogue River Red, and Native Creole. I had no idea there were so many different varieties of garlic!! It'll be interesting, in 7-8 months, to see how the tastes differ.

One of my neighbor's new varieties is Red Tosh. Inchelium was found on the Colville Indian Reservation in north central Washington. I don't know if Inchilium Red is the same variety. Applegate is possibly native to southern Oregon, as there was a pioneer family by that name, resulting in a lot of places and things having it. Rogue River Red might have come from that area as well, since the famous (to us northwesterners) Rogue River runs through that area.

This year we are trialing the "Garden Pack" from Filaree Garlic Farm. The varieties are Rocambole, Purple Stripe, Porcelain, Marbled Purple Stripe, Artichoke, Silverskin, plus "Creole & Asiatic strains".

JoAnn, each garlic will have a different intensity and "fire". You will love these gourmet garlic when you harvest them. They are absolutely nothing like what you buy at your grocery stores.

MaryE, that is so interesting how these garlic variety names came about. I just thought someone dreamed up a name and it stuck.

Ken