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market-farming - Re: [Market-farming] tropical garlic

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  • From: "Dave or Kathy Campbell" <dkcampbell AT southslope.net>
  • To: "'Market Farming'" <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Market-farming] tropical garlic
  • Date: Wed, 14 Apr 2010 08:13:55 -0500

Hi, Karen!

Your garlics are softnecks, so I believe.  Hardnecks, maybe you know, have a bulb in the ground with a single layer of cloves around the hard stem, which goes up to the topset, which also consists of small cloves. Softneck garlics were developed from the original hardneck strains by selecting for lower and lower bulb heads, until the topsets and hard stem were growing inside the lower bulb.  That’s why softnecks have multiple layers of cloves in their bulbs, and no hard stem reaching up.

However, when stressed (which your plants probably were, having been accustomed to climates and soils unlike yours) softnecks may revert to their hardneck ancestry—the hard stem elongates up out of the bulb and the topset re-emerges somewhere up the stalk.

==Dave Campbell / Tiffin IA /  Zone 5b

 

>> 3 of the plants had a bulb below surface and had formed another bulb higher up stalk above ground.  One of these high bulbs has fresh green leaves showing, so I guess I should plant again right away.  It sounds like it should be obvious, but I can't really tell if these garlic are "hard" or "soft" necked.  The 3 with high bulbs have a stiff stem between the 2 bulbs, but the others have soft, braidable stems.  Anyone?

Karen

 




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