Garlic failure

[pigletwillie]

Lift them when the leaves have mostly died off and the rust does not affect their edibility.

Enjoy them.

[Paulottie]

I also buy my planting bulbs in France PW. but Peter H's prob sounds like white rot. I had a lot of probs this year. There were some photos i took on another thread.

http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...ead.php?t=7827

[Headfry]

PW thanks, you have given me hope! other than being orange! they seem to be growing well, still no 'bulbs' yet. I will keep the sickly looking things in the ground untill they start to die down, thats if I can tell yellow from their already orange state! tee hee

[mrskp]

I'm really scared about my garlic now. I've ignored both beds for ages, not done a thing to either (Purple Wight in one and Solent Wight in the other).

Leaf tips are looking a bit yellow but otherwise still looking very healthy.

I've been waiting for them all to collapse due to white rot/rust/being ready to harvest and nothing has happened to suggest anything is wrong.

But the torrential rain has started this morning and shows no signs of stopping over the next week or so.

Should I lift them now or let them carry on their own sweet way ? If I didn't have rot before, is it about to start ?

Planted out last autumn so should have cloved up.

Might just be brave and go and lift one now, just to see !




Edit: Here's the first Purple Wight - should I adopt a safety first technique and lift everything now. If they're all like this one, I've got enough to keep us going into the next millenium. The bulb is about 5.5" round and 1.5" high. Lord knows where I'm going to dry them all.

[pigletwillie]

If they havent really started to die down you could leave them out a bit longer Mrskp but as a safety first approach why not lift some to dry out "just in case".

[mrskp]

I may do half a dozen of each tonight, just in case !

Must admit to being quite chuffed ! (although this is only the first and who knows what is going on under the soil). This might be the only one I get.

[Flummery]

They look ok. I've never had the problem (looking for wood to touch!) but I thought white rot was actually a disease in the soil rather than a problem caused by wet weather - though that might make it worse. The belt and braces approach is probably best!

[Mrs Dobby]

We've 3 batches of garlic on plot1, the first planted was overwintering Thermodyne, planted in October, its still standing up tall, the leaves are mainly yellow, and an experimental pulling showed nicley formed medium sized bulbs, but the main stem is still very green and we've decided to leave them a bit longer yet!

Second lot planting was a reduced pack from the GC, planted in January, these seem to have struggled and we thought we'd lost the lot, so pulled and dug over that bed yesterday, only to find some good sized single bulbs and a few smaller split cloves, usable if not a great success, but definitely better than we thought we were going to get!

The 3rd batch were a spring sown type, which were sown in March and seem to be growing well, only time will tell tho what sort of harvest we will get from them!

In autumn this year we are gong to plant 3 batches of overwintering onions, probably in October, as thats what we did with whats looking like our best batch for this year!

[kirsty b]

Mine (in large pots, planted March) were starting to look like they were fading, so I dug down. The bulbs are quite big, but they still feel smooth as if it hasn't split - which is a possibility, being a late planting. Does anyone know exactly when they split, if they do?

I planted mine out around Feb/march having started them off in trays so they had strong roots. I think mine may have rust (little orange spots on outer leaves) Lifted one yesterday to see how they were, bulb small but about 6 layers of skin over the cloves which have split, they are tiny but strong!
If as I suspect it is rust, do I need to get them up quick?

[BigstU]

My garlic was started off in pots late sept last year and planted in the ground about end of jan early feb and so far all is well. I have a few rust spots on some leaves but generally they are good and they are startin to die back now so harvest is looming

I dont know the variety, i got the bulbs last year from the gardening show at the royal bath and west showground in sept.

This is my 1st time using proper growing stock and not the stuff from the supermarkets.

have enclosed a pic of one i dug today, which is a purple variety, i do have some white ones too but they will be left until the foliage dies back, this one was dug for the purpose of the pic.

[lozza_9]

I pulled up most of my Garlic and they where not as bad as I thought. The bulbs where fine. Got a few more to pull up. Looking at some other people's plot alot of others had the same problem.

[Alice]

My garlic's not ready for lifting yet. The foliage still looks quite good. I've had a poke around one with my finger and it looks as if there's good big cloves down there - so I'm hopeful for a decent crop.

[sewer rat]

I'm the same Alice - mine is a spring planted garlic (Printanor) and hasn't even finished growing yet, never mind dying off. I think the cold June we've had has put a lot of plants into a semi hibernation - not a lot of growth on anything up here.

[Cutecumber]

Well, I pulled up two of my garlic plants last week (they had begun to yellow and sag) and the bulbs are small but appear to have split.

That's pretty quick from a March sowing - I hope they're ok!

Four other plants are still looking green, so I'm leaving them longer.

[Mushroom]

Flowering garlic?

My garlic hasn't started dying back yet, in fact it looks like some flower heads are forming - do I cut them off?
Also there seems to be some black/grey mouldy blotches on the stems, so I dug one up 3 weeks ago and the bulb itself was well formed & free of blotches. Should I dig them up now in case the botrytis mould spreads?