Growing Garlic Inexpensively

One good way to grow garlic is to purchase reduced for quick sale garlic bulbs. These can sometimes be found at the grocery store, natural foods store or farmer's market. Some produce from the stores won't grow if they've been sprayed with something to make them last longer. This doesn't seem to be the case for any garlic I've gotten. I grew some from the store just fine last season. Both the organic bulbs and some which were not marked organic have grown equally well. This is a great way to grow a lot of garlic very inexpensively! These garlic bulbs were all of $1.50 for the whole package! I bought them about 2 weeks ago, they weren't sprouting then. They are now sprouting and should produce well over 50 new garlic bulbs. I've bought 3 or 4 of these reduced batches, most were planted in the fall. Just got this one a couple weeks ago and I'll start them in the house and then slowly move them outdoors so they can catch up with the bulbs already in the ground. They'll all take off in the spring. The scapes that grow at first will be great in salads and stir fried meals. Later we'll have new garlic bulbs and lots of them...maybe too many. If that happens I will need to learn how to dry them and turn them into garlic powder for long term use. To plant them I break each clove off the bulb and plant them in the fall, since I'm in the northeast. They've grow a bit and then winter will set in and halt the growth. They'll start up again in the spring. Scapes should be ready to pick in early summer and the bulbs themselves should be done in mid to late summer.

Looks like these garlic bulbs from the store would rather be planted than used right away!