Question on Garlic

[Greenleaves]

These bulb-lets are called scapes, and are also edible. They are usually removed so they don't divert too many of the growing resources away from the main bulb.

Are they? I thought scapes were the flower stalk of hard neck varieties.

Perhaps someone can correct me if I am wrong?

[Snadger]

The Growing Garlic | How To Grow | Grow Your Own
says clove tip about 3cms below the surface.
What that is inches I know not

That's about 1& 3/16ths of an inch. Just about the height you should be cutting your grass at this time of year.

[Thelma Sanders]

That's about 1& 3/16ths of an inch. Just about the height you should be cutting your grass at this time of year.

Assuming the ruddy stuff wasn't always too wet for the mower *grumble grump* sorry ...

[Chris11]

Are they? I thought scapes were the flower stalk of hard neck varieties. Perhaps someone can correct me if I am wrong?

I think you're right

The mini-bulbs I think are called bulbils or top-sets rather than bulblets, and they form on the scape if it is allowed to mature.

[Zelenina]

Hardneck kinds of garlic have bulbils on the scapes where you would think there ought to be flowers. But sometimes softneck garlics form a short hard stalk with bulbils part way up. I've had some like that and I think that's what Ancient Mariner is talking about. I should think they can be grown just the same as the regular bulbils from scapes, but it might take more than one season for them to reach full size with separate cloves.

[Zelenina]

Now Kelvin's question about depth of planting garlic. I've seen a variety of depths recommended and it seems to depend on how cold your winters are. Here in Slovakia, where they are usually pretty cold, we don't want our garlic shoots to show above the ground until the worst of the winter is over. And we don't usually plant them until later, after the first winter frost but before the ground freezes long-term. In fact round about now would be fine. And I will plant them quite deep. But in Dublin it shouldn't get so cold so it probably doesn't matter so much. I expect they'll all come up fine.