It is rare to find a garden or a summer cottage, where garlic does not occupy beds. This culture, beloved by many, is necessary for conservation, it gives special appeal to various dishes, and there are more than enough useful properties of the plant.
Garlic propagates by dividing the bulbs into cloves and bulbs - air bulbs that grow on the arrow. Full-grown bulbs grow from the teeth in the first year, and in order to get a crop from the bulbs, it will take three years. Because of this, some gardeners refuse this method of reproduction, and in vain. Having familiarized themselves with the advantages of this method of cultivation, they often change their minds and ask questions: "When, where and how to plant garlic seeds?"
Benefits of Garlic Propagation with Bulbs
Garlic grows smaller over the years, so it needs rejuvenation every five years, and preferably three years.
If there are only 4-10 pieces in a bulb of garlic cloves, then each arrow lays bulb from 20 to 150 in a bulb. This method of reproduction allows you to get a large amount of healthy seed material, maintain the quality of garlic, and grow a full crop that is resistant to diseases and pests.
Garlic has a peculiarity: bulbs do not infect fungal, viral and bacterial infections. Pure planting material has great potential, due to which the crop is obtained of high quality.
When cultivated with cloves, about a seventh of the total crop is consumed for planting, and when propagated by bulbs, the cost of marketable garlic does not occur. This is another plus in favor of air bulbs - profitability.
How to grow garlic from bulbs
As you can see, there are many reasons for using this particular planting material. Having studied the benefits of propagating garlic seeds, gardeners begin to think about how to grow garlic from bulbs. And this is correct, because not every garlic is able to give air bulbs, this property is inherent only in winter shoot varieties.
Sowing can be grown in two ways - by planting garlic bulbs in the fall and spring. And there is also a technique developed by experienced summer residents, with the help of which they get large air bulbs that can give a full crop in the second year of vegetation.
How to grow large planting material
Experienced gardeners know how to grow garlic from bulbs in such a way as to get not a small seed set, but a large one-tooth tooth next summer. The secret of this method is simple - the tooth when planting is placed in a growth limiter, which will serve, for example, as a piece of plastic pipe.
Teeth sown before winter. In early spring, the plants start growing and form flower arrows in early summer. To prevent sudden wind gusts from breaking them, it is recommended to tie the arrows to the stakes.
The limiter prevents the clove from growing and developing, as a result of which all nutrition is directed to the development of the arrow. Thus obtained aerial bulbs are much larger than during traditional vegetation.
In mid-summer, the development of garlic comes to an end, the tops turn yellow. Arrows are cut and bundled. To prevent shedding of the bulbs, the peduncle balls are tied with gauze. Bunches are turned over and hung in the attic.
Planting garlic bulbs in the fall
The collected bulbs need about a month in order to dry thoroughly and mature completely. After that, the onion bulbs are threshed and calibrated. For planting garlic from bulbs for the winter, the largest seeds are selected.
Typically, the landing time is in the month of October. It depends on the weather and climate. It is necessary that before the onset of frost, the bulbs are rooted, but do not have time to germinate.
When planting garlic from bulbs for the winter, a lot of planting material is pushed by frosts onto the soil surface. When spring planting, of course, this does not happen, the bulbs immediately start growing, but the yield is lower. Yes, and save bulbs until spring does not work for everyone. After weighing all the pros and cons, everyone decides for himself when to plant bulbs - in spring or autumn.
To increase germination and yield for 10 days, the bulbs are stratified. This is done immediately before planting in the ground in this way: air bulbs are placed in a gauze bag and sent to the bottom shelf of the refrigerator. Moreover, they are kept there only at night, and during the day they are removed and left at room temperature.
Some gardeners prefer to plant bulbs immediately in a permanent place, maintaining the planting pattern, as when planting with teeth - 8 centimeters from each other, the distance between the rows is 25-30 centimeters. With this method, the seeds are not removed, but left on the same bed.
If the area of the land does not allow, you can thicken the planting by thinning the plants next fall.
Since the onion bulbs are much smaller than the prongs, the question arises of how deep the garlic bulbs should be planted. Seeds are planted in prepared soil to a depth of 4-5 centimeters. As a rule, this is enough to prevent them from being pushed to the surface of the frozen ground, the plants are normally rooted, grown and developed.
Depending on soil moisture, grooves are pre-watered. It is advisable to mulch above the planting to prevent drying out and germination of weeds. For this, plant residues, peat or sawdust are suitable. The thickness of the mulching layer is usually 2-3 centimeters.
Spring planting
How to grow garlic from bulbs in spring? Plants are planted densely according to the tape scheme. The ribbons are cut 90 centimeters wide, each row produces 7 rows. Between the tapes withstand a distance of 30-40 centimeters. The embedment depth is 3 centimeters, the consumption of planting material per 1 linear meter is up to 100 bulbs, when growing seedlings with an autumn transplant.
If garlic is not supposed to be transplanted in the fall, air bulbs are planted less often, using 33 small or 25 large ones per 1 meter.
They begin to plant as soon as the soil ripens. Usually this is April - early May. A bed prepared from the fall is loosened, equalized with a rake, nitroammophoska is introduced - 40 g per square meter.
Seat selection
The best precursors for planting garlic are legumes, pumpkin, cabbage and perennial herbs. After tomatoes and potatoes, it is not recommended to plant garlic in order to avoid infection with fusarium.
Garlic prefers light, loose soils of neutral acidity. For planting, you should choose a well-lit place on a hill so that meltwater does not lead to freezing and infection of plants.
Soil preparation
It will be important to note that an excess of organic matter in the soil provokes an abundant growth of garlic tops, and the teeth are crooked and small.
Under landing make in the soil:
- wood ash - 300 g;
- humus - 700 g;
- potassium sulfate and superphosphate - 50 g per square meter.
After that, the earth is dug up.
It is necessary to prepare the soil in advance - not later than 1.5-2 weeks before the planting of air bulbs.
Acidic soils are recommended to be produced (300-400 g of lime per square meter are added).
Care
Growing garlic from bulbs is no more complicated than from cloves. Care consists in timely weeding and cultivation, since weeds are very inhibitory growth of young plants. Shallow loosening after rains and watering is especially desirable.
It is watered in dry and hot weather once every 10 days, moistening the soil to a depth of 8-10 centimeters.
For the entire vegetation period, 3 top dressings are carried out:
- the first - a month after emergence, for which 10 g of superphosphate and ammonium nitrate are applied per square meter of area;
- the second - after 15 days with the same fertilizers, but of a lower concentration;
- the third - at the end of July (300 g of wood ash per square meter).
Harvest
We examined the question of how to plant garlic seeds. With this method of reproduction, you can leave the sowing to grow further on the same bed or remove in the fall and transplant to a new place.
Each one decides for himself, weighing labor costs and efficiency, and if nevertheless the decision to transplant the garlic is made, the main thing is to remove the toothbrushes in time. This is best done when the leaves of the plants begin to turn yellow. Do not overexposure sevoc in the ground, as it will be poorly stored.
Harvesting is carried out in the morning on a cloudy day, as the direct rays of the sun spoil the teeth and make them unsuitable for subsequent planting.
The collected onions are dried under a canopy before being put into storage, or further cultivation.
Storage
How to store garlic bulbs? Before planting in the ground, air bulbs must be preserved so that they do not dry out and do not ripen. To do this, planting material is packed in a newspaper or put in a small box, a cardboard box and placed in a dry, dark place in which the temperature is maintained at least 18-20 degrees Celsius.
They are stored there until February, then the onions are removed, transferred to a refrigerator or cellar. You can pour them into a cloth bag and bury them in snow. This is done so that the bulbs pass stratification and get an impetus to the beginning of the growing season. Then they are dried, aired, cleaned dried and spoiled, soaked in a weak solution of potassium permanganate and planted on beds.