Today's video we're going to revisit a
crop that I tried and failed to grow last year. And that would be garlic. Kevin Espiritu here from Epic Gardening
where it's my goal to help you grow green thumb, including myself. And let's talk just for a moment before
we get into the meat of the video. Why did my garlic fail last year? And why is this part two of garlic
care more than one season from the last one? Well, it's because at the old Epic
Garden, which many of you, OG followers, remember, there were a lot of different
issues that were going on there. I had a skunk dig up
my garlic three times. You're talking about a plant
that grows for at least 120 days in the spring, maybe 220
days if you plant it in the fall. If you have something, dig that
up, you're not long for this world. And neither are your garlic bulbs. I had a skunk dig it up three
different times in my old garden. So this one behind me
here, nothing's dug it up. We're past the point that I
got to in the last garlic grow. So we're here to talk today about
garlic care from after the cloves sprouts, up until the point
where scapes start to form. If you're growing hard neck, or you need to think about harvesting
and storing and using that garlic. So it's that middle part. So cultivate that like button and I will
personally bless you with a botanical enchantment for your garlic. So it will
become a 10% larger and bulbs size? We want big bulbs...and
let's get into the video. So if you're familiar
with the part one video, you'll know that the way I've planted
this second crop of garlic looks quite different than the first. The
first was in a raised bed. This one of course is in the ground.
Why? First of all, I have the space here. That was one of the big reasons for
moving to the Epic Homestead is I actually have space to grow. But number two, I wanted to experiment with a deeper
mulch and a deeper burial method that I felt might work better in
the ground. So what I did, I have 10 varieties of garlic.
Nine are hardneck. One is softneck. Now in a warm zone, you typically
do want to grow a softneck garlic. They're more suited and
they perform better. So why am I growing nine
hardneck varieties? Number one, I want to taste garlic scapes.
I want to grow garlic scapes. That's a big reason for me. It's a
delicacy and I really want to have that. Number two, I just want to
experiment, see if I can do it, but what did I do to mitigate against
some of the problems you might run into growing hardneck? Well, what I did is I kept all those clothes
in the fridge for about three months or so. And then I buried them
about six inches deep, covered that with two inches of mushroom
compost as sort of a nice organic top-dress mulch. And then
another four inches of straw. The reason why is because with garlic, you want to keep the soil temperatures
low until that bulbing process starts here in San Diego Zone 10b the soil
temperatures can get pretty warm. I threw a soil thermometer in the ground
over there just to check it's about maybe eight inches down or so. And we're
looking at about 60 degrees Fahrenheit, 15 and a half Celsius. So
I know that this mulching, I would call it like a double mulch and
a deep bur method seems to be working pretty well for my climate, but we need to get into what you
do at this point of their growth. As with anything in the garden.
observation is really the key. So let's just take a
look really quickly here. So you've got a nice stalk coming out.
There's the newest growth right here. Here's some of the older leaves. You
are seeing a tiny bit of yellowing here, but I don't think it's anything to be
concerned about. A nice vibrant green. And we have maybe one, two, three,
four, five, six, seven leaves. We're still in the leaf phase where
it's putting out a ton of leaves to get energy, to form the bulb. Let's talk watering for your garlic while
it's still putting out a ton of leafy growth. And then after that, I'll show
you a cool way that I like to fertilize, but I'm just gonna use this little
fan attachment here on my Hoselink. As we talk about this, the thing about
garlic is it's a shallow rooted plant. You have your bulb. First of all, you
have your clove, then you have your bulb, right? And as soon as
that bulb starts to form, when you pull a garlic out of the ground, you know that the roots maybe go to
here or so maybe a couple inches. And so that means that if the water is
not present in that very shallow root zone during this all-important growth
phase, you're in a pretty bad spot. It's not going to develop much further.
It's not going to grow much further, no matter how much light it gets, no
matter how much fertilizer it gets. What's really nice about this particular
method, at least so far for me, is that I've buried it so deep that I
really don't have to water extremely frequently. I've got it about five
inches, six inches deep. And then again, I have multiple layers of mulch
on top. I've got the straw, which not only reflects heat
because it's light colored, but also it's a really good insulator.
And so it keeps the soil nice and cool. That said, of course, you
still do have to water it. Now, the thing about when to water, everyone
asks this question in the garden. When do I water? How often do I water? The real answer is when
the plant needs it. I do have a full video on watering
mistakes that you might be making. You need to know what the plant wants, the specific plant you're growing in this
case. Garlic know how the plant grows. If you know, it has a shallow
root system, of course, that's going to change the way that
you approach both the watering and the planting of the plant. Now, another
thing I'll say specifically, again, if you are in this warmer zone or you
planted your garlic in the spring and not the fall, I would say you probably might want
to consider some sort of shade cloth. So pretty soon when I'm going to do is
I'm going to erect a couple of little stakes in the corners here, and we'll
lay some 50% shade cloth over the top. 50% means half the sunlight should be cut. Now that does hamper a little bit of the
photosynthesis, but it's a, trade-off, I'd rather have a little bit less light
to prevent the heat buildup on the soil. And then of course, down in the bulb zone where it's really
not going to like that until it starts to bulb up. So we're just
about done watering here. I could probably go a little harder if
you're unfamiliar about how to actually know if you're finished watering,
just dig down in the soil, build a familiarity and you'll get to
it. But now let's talk about fertilizing. So how do you actually fertilize
your garlic effectively? Especially if you've planted a
ton of it. Like I have, well, you can just sprinkle granular fertilizer
around and then water it in every so often. And eventually it will break down. I personally have been really preferential
to using a liquid fertilizer of which I have right here. This is a Espoma
Organic's liquid, all purpose. So it's a two two two and it is
bioavailable right away because it's water soluble. So a liquid can
be really good for that, but how do I actually apply this? Do I
dilute it in water? And then dah, dah, dah, whatever. No, you do this. This is what I've really become a
fan of here at the Epic Homestead. Fertigation so irrigation
plus fertilizing fertigation. Now what you'll do here is
you'll hook this to a hose. So I'll do it for you right now.
This says insecticide sprayer. Don't worry about that. I'm
using it for fertilizer. So what you do give this a nice, good shake and this fills
up to about five gallons or so. So what I'm going to do is the back of
this says use about one dose per gallon, maybe two doses per gallon. I'm
going to go on the lighter side. So I'll use one. So I'm just going to
go one. So that was one gallon worth. It'll refill two gallons
worth three, four, and I've got five. Okay. So that's what I'm putting in. And then I have to fill this up because
what we're doing here is we're using this as a siphon. We're going to hook it into this
hose system and then use it to spray, which you'll see in a
second. So it's really handy. So now all I want to
do is just pop this in. We'll fill it up to five and
that seems like it's not a lot, but it is. It's exactly what we want to
do. So there we go. We've got enough, let's plug it in and let's
water. So check it out. We have our sprayer all connected, and this is why I watered beforehand
because now it's way more likely to get all the way down there because the
water has sort of permeated and wet the initial surface. And so all I'm doing is just coming in and fertigating baby! Such a satisfying thing when you can
apply a dilute fertilizer to a large space effectively. And we're actually
hitting the plant leaves a little bit. I'm not saying it's a
perfect foliar spray, but I'm not saying that it's not either.
I mean, it will do something right. And so now, as soon as
this runs down to here, I'll know I've applied about five gallons
worth of lightly fertilized water to my garlic. And we're in a good spot. Two more points on fertilizing before we
move on to some problems you might run into. Number one, you really want to cut out the fertilizing
as you start to see bulb formation, but how do you know? Right? Because
the bulbs form under the ground, you want to look for the stock to start
to really thicken up a decent amount of leaf growth on top. That will be your
cue to cut fertilizing completely. Just keep it well, watered and manage some of the issues
that we'll talk about in a second. And as far as frequency goes,
I would say maybe three, four times throughout the season up until
right before that bulb starts to form is probably a good idea. Again, you're
trying to get those leaves really, really nice and bushy, nice and healthy. So it can send all that
energy down into the bulb. But now let's talk about some problems
you might run into with garlic. Number one, being weeding. You want
to make sure and keep your patch, whether it's in a raised bed or a
container, whatever clear of weeds. So the mulch is doing
a good job over there, but I still see some Bermuda grass
and some annoying stuff pop in. I want to make sure and clear that out
because it's not a good competitor plant. Garlic likes to be left
alone and likes to be babied. It's kind of like that movie
Wall-E where us humans. We want like everything thrown in our
face and become nice and fat and happy. That's what you want to do to your garlic. Treat your garlic like the
human beings in Wall-E. Keep them clear of anything
that might annoy them. Another thing that might happen is
you might run into some disease. The ones that typically happen is
garlic rust. That is a fungal disease. You might just have to cut it away. You could maybe hit it with
an organic copper fungicide, but generally by the time
it's there, it's there. So you can cut that leaf off the bulb
itself won't even be affected at all. You can eat the bulb. The bulb might be
smaller because the leaves are dying, but it's not a big deal. You may
also run into powdery mildew, but that's going to be, if the conditions are right late summer
is a perfect time for powdery mildew to show up overcast spring days, perfect
time for powdery mildew to show up. So keep an eye on it. Maybe it
keeps circulation of air high, that kind of thing. But again, powdery,
mildew just happens in the garden. You can't do everything in your power
to prevent it from a pest perspective, there's some thrips and mites and
stuff. But generally speaking, a lot of stuff doesn't really
like to be around garlic. So I don't think that's going
to be a huge issue for you. Garlic is one of those crops that
you just get an immense sense of accomplishment when you
harvest it. Because number
one, it's a long season crop. A lot of things can go wrong. You guys know the skunk decimated
my crop at the old Epic Garden. There's no way that's happening
this time. I will camp out here. I will send blessings up to the gardening
gods and I will put a camera up if need be. This is my baby. I am a single father of 110
garlic over here. So there you go. That's what I wanted to show you guys, as far as this part of garlic care in
part three, which will be coming up, we'll talk about the garlic scapes.
We'll talk about when to harvest, how to harvest, how to dry and use
and cure and all that kind of stuff. So subscribe if you want to hear
that good luck in the garden, keep your garlic bulbs
big...and keep on growing.
