Garden is in and scapes are getting cut

[Addie]

Our weather in SE Wisconsin is moist but not overly so.

We're trying a few new things this year. We planted soy beans and chick peas--we use them so it's an experiment to see if we can grow them.

And we save seeds normally but have a difficult time finding good germination rates on keeper onions. Onion seeds do best the first year after harvesting them but the germination rates plummet fast. This isn't true of tomato and pepper seeds, those keep for many years.

So we took keeper onions (utah yellow spanish and mako) that kept well all the way to May without sprouting, and we planted them in the garden. Onions sprout the flower stalks and flower the second year of life. It looks like we have 25 stalks now. We put in stakes and that helps hold them up. Each flower will give 40-50 seeds. We'll plant those next feb-march in trays, then put them in the garden in may-june. A few hundred onions will get us through next winter. That's our more fun experiment.

I am impressed with your energy. I have formed the opinion that you are a farmer of sorts? I just have to ask.

But what the heck are scapes?

 

[blissful]

We aren't farmers but we try to grow as much food as we can in 2000+ square feet of gardens. We live on an acre. It's a great hobby.


Scapes are the flower stalks of garlic.

 

[Addie]

We aren't farmers but we try to grow as much food as we can in 2000+ square feet of gardens. We live on an acre. It's a great hobby.

Scapes are the flower stalks of garlic.

Oh how I envy you. I learned how to plant garlic many years ago. Had great success. But then I moved from there. If I get the buckets I want for planting, I can do it next year again. My two favorite foods to cook with are butter and garlic. In this family the motto is, "You can never have too much garlic." And it is very good for the heart.

 

[larry_stewart]

We aren't farmers but we try to grow as much food as we can in 2000+ square feet of gardens. We live on an acre. It's a great hobby.


Scapes are the flower stalks of garlic.

2000 + square feet of gardens. Would I love to have that!!!.

Here is all the garlic hanging in there garlic farms barn. I may have posted this pic a few years ago, but Its worth posting again. I do the same in my garage, not as many and not as nice looking, but I still get a kick out of walking into the garage to a mild scent of garlic and being able to grab a head or two and make my way back to the kitchen.

I gotta get myself 2000 Square feet of garden and a barn!!!

 

[blissful]

The hanging garlic does look neat Larry.
We do hang ours on the underside of the deck overhang. We cover the overhang with tarp for a month to shield the garlic from rain, while it cures (dries). Then we trim it top and bottom and put them in paper grocery bags (like onions).



All the garden space does keep us busy as bees and it can have times it's overwhelming. We start plants as early as feb-march and we can the vegetables into late September possibly October. At the end of bean canning and tomato canning I have been heard saying, I don't want to see another bean or tomato EVER!!! I hate tomatoes keep them away from me. Then I get over it. By November I'm longing for our fresh tomatoes.

 

[Addie]

2000 + square feet of gardens. Would I love to have that!!!.

Here is all the garlic hanging in there garlic farms barn. I may have posted this pic a few years ago, but Its worth posting again. I do the same in my garage, not as many and not as nice looking, but I still get a kick out of walking into the garage to a mild scent of garlic and being able to grab a head or two and make my way back to the kitchen.

I gotta get myself 2000 Square feet of garden and a barn!!!

Garlic along with butter are my two favorite foods. Using them in my cooking always gives me my "Bam!"

Today, I am making an omelet with a half of a huge Vidalia onion and a couple of small red and orange peppers. Of course a couple of cloves of garlic with enhance it for me.

 

[bbqcoder]

We planted soy beans and chick peas--
And we save seeds normally but have a difficult time finding good germination rates on keeper onions. Onion seeds do best the first year after harvesting them but the germination rates plummet fast. This isn't true of tomato and pepper seeds, those keep for many years.



So we took keeper onions (utah yellow spanish and mako) that kept well all the way to May without sprouting, and we planted them in the garden. Onions sprout the flower stalks and flower the second year of life. It looks like we have 25 stalks now. We put in stakes and that helps hold them up. Each flower will give 40-50 seeds. We'll plant those next feb-march in trays, then put them in the garden in may-june. A few hundred onions will get us through next winter. That's our more fun experiment.

I planted soy beans last year and had a bumper crop. They were fun to grow.

If you like onions, you might want to check out potato onions. They are similar to shallots/garlic in that you plant a small bulb and they divide themselves. They are also a very good keeper onion. I still have a bunch from my harvest last year that have not sprouted.

I have left a few onions in my garden over winter and they sprouted in the spring. Growing them for the seeds. I wonder if you can do the same in your zone? I’m in zone 6.

What varieties of garlic are you growing?

 

[blissful]

I planted soy beans last year and had a bumper crop. They were fun to grow.

If you like onions, you might want to check out potato onions. They are similar to shallots/garlic in that you plant a small bulb and they divide themselves. They are also a very good keeper onion. I still have a bunch from my harvest last year that have not sprouted.

I have left a few onions in my garden over winter and they sprouted in the spring. Growing them for the seeds. I wonder if you can do the same in your zone? I’m in zone 6.

What varieties of garlic are you growing?

Hi bbqcoder, we started the soybeans twice now and the rabbits and chipmunks are eating the sprouts! We are at battle with the rabbits lately.


We are in 4b, 5a. We did have a few onions we left over winter and they did sprout as well, into the stalks.


We use about 200-300 onions a year, for cooking, so I try to get the kind that lasts through winter and into spring, at least baseball sized.



We used to grow 5-6 kinds of garlic but this year we are growing a large very white music, and a large Russian Red. Our Russian Red is so large and the cloves are 3 times the size of a regular clove of garlic. I've gotten used to using the large ones now, I'm kind of spoiled with that. Thanks for asking.

 

[pepperhead212]

I'm also prefer those large cloved garlics, @blissful. I hate peeling all those little cloves, when I need a tb or two of minced garlic! Estonian Red is a favorite of mine, and one of the largest, but not the best storing garlic, so I use it first. Siberian red is new to me, but is also very large. Metechi is an old favorite, with an intense flavor, and longer storage than most hardnecks, which is why I planted the more of that - 72 cloves - then 48 and 48 of the others.

I usually harvest around 7-4, plus or minus a few days. The smaller, stunted heads I set aside, and use those first, cured briefly, with the early tomatoes. They are hard to peel uncured, but they are delicious, and the first super-fresh garlic since a year ago!

 

[skilletlicker]

Garlic Scape Nutritional Data

We aren't farmers but we try to grow as much food as we can in 2000+ square feet of gardens. We live on an acre. It's a great hobby.
Scapes are the flower stalks of garlic.

2000 + square feet of gardens. Would I love to have that!!!.

Here is all the garlic hanging in there garlic farms barn. I may have posted this pic a few years ago, but Its worth posting again. I do the same in my garage, not as many and not as nice looking, but I still get a kick out of walking into the garage to a mild scent of garlic and being able to grab a head or two and make my way back to the kitchen.

I gotta get myself 2000 Square feet of garden and a barn!!!

Asking on behalf of an acquaintance in another online community. Does anybody know if the nutritional data for garlic scapes have been analyzed and published?

 

[larry_stewart]

Last year I planted 60 Garlic.
I also harvest about July 4th ( its become a tradition).
The 60 heads lasted until December ( 6 months)
This year, I planted 120, so I can get a year out of them.
I prefer the larger cloves too.
I usually get my seed garlic from a Garlic Farm In Connecticut . In addition, When Im there I chew the farmers ear off for any tips and suggestions I can get.
They grow German White Variety
The cloves are large, and I figure if they are the right variety to grow in Connecticut, then they should ( and do do well) in New York ( Im maybe 30 - 40 miles south) of the farm.

The Garlic Farm grows vegetables in Granby, CT

Last year I probably could have let them go a week or two longer, to maybe get a little more growth.

The smaller heads I use when pickling.

Each year , Connecticut has an " Open Farm Day", where about a dozen or so farms open their doors, give lectures on certain topics, samples , open farm stands .... You can download a map of all the farms that participate. Ive done this for the past few years. Thats when I pick up my seed garlic. I also use some from may harvest to seed also.

I love garlic, and so far , it has been a very predictable, productive and low maintenance crop.

 

[blissful]

Skilletlicker, General information on garlic is in the usda database. Not scapes sorry.
So here for garlic: https://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/foods/show/301861


Nutritionfacts.org , type in garlic and there are pages and videos on garlic/cancer/flavinoids/antioxidants, comparing different cancers and how garlic and other vegetables affect it.


I don't see anything particular about scapes.



I think we'll be harvesting around the 10th of July, for garlic. We usually harvest on week 2 or 3 of July each year.


Shall we all celebrate our garlic with some garlic soup. Either the rich variety of soup, or the tomato/garlic type, with or without dried bread to give it some body? I think I will!

 

[skilletlicker]

Skilletlicker, General information on garlic is in the usda database. Not scapes sorry.
So here for garlic: https://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/foods/show/301861

Thanks, blissful.
I doubt scapes are nutritionally equivalent to bulbs but suggested he use those numbers until better information comes along. Thought there might be other information known to those with such an abiding interest in the topic.

 

[bbqcoder]

Last year I probably could have let them go a week or two longer, to maybe get a little more growth.

How do you know when to harvest your garlic? If you pick too early, you can miss a large part of their growth. Supposedly they do most of their growth in the last month. But you don't want to wait too long because then they will have fewer wrappers. The more wrappers are on the bulb, the longer they last.

Last year, I cut all of my scapes early. This year, I'm leaving a lot on. Supposedly when the scape straighten out, it's time to harvest. I also heard harvesting when there are 4-6 green leaves left on the plant.

One problem with having many varieties of garlic is that they will have different harvest times.

 

[blissful]

Larry and bbq, I harvest when 1/3 rd of the leaves are yellow.



Now let's say I'm not sure, and I leave them in the ground, and it rains or is wet, then it is possible to get grubs or insects invading the clove.



Or let's say I take them out early, then how do I know? I usually can tell if they are ready when each clove of garlic bulges just a little more than the areas between the garlic cloves. So the whole bulb has a very slightly bumpy looking outside.


So on this Music garlic, do you see how the cloves are a little bigger than the areas between the cloves?

 

[bethzaring]

We had a freeze last night and I lost 7 tomato plants. Crazy weather.

 

[blissful]

We had a freeze last night and I lost 7 tomato plants. Crazy weather.

HI Beth! Wow that is crazy weather!

 

[bbqcoder]

So on this Music garlic, do you see how the cloves are a little bigger than the areas between the cloves?

Good tip, thanks! So do you dig around to uncover a few bulbs to do an inspection to confirm that it's ready for harvesting?

 

[larry_stewart]

Ive always picked July 4th ( just tradition).
Ive read 3 weeks after you cut the scapes ( which actually turns out to be about July 4th)

The garlic farmer said he basically digs a few up as ' test bulbs' to see where they're at. That being said, thats easy to do when you have acres and acres of garlic. I dont want to spare any.

I just looked at his website and they pick theirs mid - July , so I may wait the extra week.

I also pay attention the the yellow leaves, Bliss, luckily all these things seam to happen about the same time, so I guess all the methods are relatively accurate.

By accident I was aggressively picking a scape last week and the soil must be loose ( due to al the rain) and I lifted a bulb out by accident. It was decent size, but obviously needed a few weeks. I tucked it back in the ground hoping it will last a few more weeks to grow a little bit more ( knowing its unlikely but worth a shot).

 

[blissful]

bbq-yes, I do, I dig up a couple in the middle of the row, if they are ready, they all get dug or pulled, washed, sit dry, hung up, labeled. (washing is optional)