How to grow garlic anywhere with a proper winter

Garlic is planted in autumn and lifted the next summer. The timing is set by your first autumn frost: plant from about four weeks before it to four weeks after. That gives the cloves time to root before the ground gets cold, then a winter of chill to split into a proper bulb.

It’s one of the easiest crops there is. It needs sun, decent drainage and very little else, and a single bulb from this year’s harvest is next year’s seed.

When to plant, wherever you are

Garlic’s calendar is easiest to read from your own frost dates rather than a month.

Your first autumn frost	Plant garlic
Late September	Late August to late October
Mid-October	Mid-September to mid-November
End of October	Early October to late November
Mid-November	Mid-October to mid-December

You can also plant in late winter or early spring, from about ten to five weeks before your last frost. Spring garlic still crops, but the bulbs are usually smaller and some won’t divide into cloves, because they’ve had less cold.

Where winters barely dip below freezing, garlic struggles to form bulbs. Growers in mild climates often give the cloves a few weeks in the fridge before planting to make up for it.

Choosing garlic

There are two main types.

• Hardneck garlic is very hardy and suits cold winters. It has fewer, bigger cloves and sends up a curly flower stalk, the scape, in early summer.
• Softneck garlic has more, smaller cloves and keeps for longer. It’s better suited to milder winters, and it’s the type you can plait.

Buy certified seed garlic from a garden centre or supplier. Pick firm, plump bulbs with no soft or mouldy cloves.

Planting

1. Choose a sunny spot that drains well. Garlic rots in ground that stays waterlogged over winter. On heavy soil, plant in a raised bed or on a ridge.
2. Split the bulb into cloves just before planting. Plant the biggest and use the smallest in the kitchen.
3. Push each clove in, pointed end up, so the tip is about 2.5 cm (1 inch) below the surface.
4. Space cloves 15 cm (6 inches) apart in rows 30 cm (12 inches) apart.

In places with long, hard winters, cover the bed with a thick mulch of straw or leaves once the ground starts to freeze, and pull it back in spring. Garlic is hardy to about -15 °C (5 °F), and the mulch protects it below that.

Garlic grows happily near tomatoes, carrots, beetroot, strawberries and rhubarb. Keep it away from peas and beans.

Through spring and summer

Weed regularly, as garlic has thin, upright leaves that can’t shade out competition. Water in dry spells while the bulbs are swelling, then stop a couple of weeks before harvest.

If you grow hardneck garlic, snap off the scapes once they curl. The plant then puts its energy into the bulb, and the scapes are good to eat.

Harvesting and curing

Garlic is usually ready from early to mid-summer, about two to four months after your last spring frost. Lift it when about half the leaves have turned brown. Each green leaf is a papery layer around the bulb, so if you wait until every leaf is dead, the bulbs split and won’t keep.

Loosen the soil with a fork rather than pulling, then dry the bulbs somewhere airy and out of the sun for two to three weeks. Once the skins are papery, trim the roots and stalks, or plait softnecks, and store them somewhere cool and dry.

Common problems

Rust. Orange spots on the leaves, worse in damp summers. It looks bad but usually only shrinks the bulbs slightly. Give plants space and don’t grow garlic in the same bed two years running.

Bulbs that don’t split into cloves. Too little cold, from late planting or a mild winter.

Rot over winter. Wet soil. Plant on a ridge or in a raised bed next time.

For dates in a particular climate, see planting garlic in the UK or garlic in zone 5, or set your own frost dates on the garlic page.