Plant Fall Garlic in Zone 7: A Plain Guide

If you want the easiest crop on your whole farm, plant garlic this fall. You put the cloves in the ground once, cover them, and basically ignore them until summer. A single fall planting gives you a head of garlic for nearly every meal next year, and you can keep replanting the best heads each fall so you never have to buy seed again.

The catch is timing. Garlic does not care about a calendar date as much as it cares about getting a real period of winter cold. That cold is what triggers the bulb to form. So you plant in fall, the clove grows roots and a little top growth, sleeps through winter, then finishes the job next spring and summer.

This guide is written for zone 7, though most of it applies anywhere with a cold winter. It is aimed at a first-time gardener, so nothing here assumes you already know your way around a seed catalog.

Why plant in fall, not spring

Garlic is what growers call a winter-hardy crop that needs vernalization. Vernalization just means the plant needs a stretch of cold to switch from growing leaves to making a bulb. If you plant in spring, the clove usually forms a small, loose bulb or sometimes just a single round clove, because it never got enough cold.

So the fall planting is not a clever trick. It is the plant's natural cycle. You are getting it into the ground early enough that it settles in before the ground freezes, then the winter does the work.

Hardneck or softneck

Before you buy, decide which type you want, because they are different plants.

• Hardneck garlic produces a stiff central stalk and a curly flower stem called a scape. It handles colder winters well, which makes it a common choice in zone 6 and 7. The bulbs have fewer, larger cloves, and the scapes are a tasty early-summer crop you cut and eat. Downside: it stores a shorter time.
• Softneck garlic has no hard central stalk, which is why you can braid it. It does better in mild climates and stores longer, often many months. This is the kind you usually find in grocery stores.

In zone 7 you can grow both. If you want the longest storage and you are not sure about your winter, softneck is the lower-risk choice. If you want bigger cloves and don't mind eating the scapes, hardneck is a great pick.

Buy real seed garlic

Do not plant cloves from the grocery store if you can help it. Grocery garlic is often treated with something to stop it sprouting, so it may sit in the ground and do nothing. Seed garlic, sold by farms and garden suppliers in fall, is grown to be planted.

When your seed garlic arrives, break the heads into individual cloves. Leave the papery skin on. Pick out the biggest, plumpest cloves to plant. Small cloves tend to give small bulbs. Eat the runts or toss them. You want roughly one large clove per spot where you want a head of garlic.

When to plant in zone 7

Write the date in pencil, because it changes with the year. In zone 7 the sweet spot is usually late October to early November, about two to four weeks before the ground freezes hard.

You want the cloves to grow roots and maybe a first leaf before dormancy, but you do not want them to sprout fully and get damaged by a hard freeze. If a warm spell pushes things, it is better to plant a little late than too early.

If you miss late autumn entirely, plant as soon as the ground thaws in early spring. You will get something edible, just not as big. Fall is the real season.

Site and soil

Garlic wants full sun and soil that drains. The biggest killer of fall-planted garlic is sitting in waterlogged ground over winter, which rots the cloves. If your bed holds puddles, raise it or improve the drainage.

Before planting, loosen the soil and mix in a little compost. Skip fresh manure in the planting area. Fresh manure can encourage rot and is not what a clove needs at planting time. Garlic is not a heavy feeder at this stage.

How to plant

Once your bed is ready, planting is simple.

1. Push each clove into the soil, flat root plate down and pointy tip up. It is easy to get this wrong, because the tip is not always obvious. The flat end is the root end.
2. Plant the clove so the top sits roughly one to two inches below the soil surface in zone 7. In colder zones, go a little deeper to protect it from frost heave.
3. Space the cloves four to six inches apart, with about six to eight inches between rows.
4. Cover the cloves with soil and firm it gently. You do not need to water heavily; moist fall soil is usually enough.
5. Then move to mulching below.

A good mental picture: each clove is a little rocket aimed at the sky, with just enough soil over it to keep it cozy.

Mulch for winter

After planting, cover the bed with four to six inches of straw or shredded leaves. This layer does two jobs. It keeps the soil temperature steady through winter, which prevents frost heave from pushing cloves out of the ground. And it holds moisture and suppresses weeds through the growing season.

Straw is the classic choice because it is light and airy. Shredded leaves work well too. Do not press it down into a soggy mat; keep it loose enough for water and air to move.

In spring, the garlic will push shoots right through the mulch. You can leave a lighter layer in place to keep weeds down.

What happens next

In early spring the garlic shoots green up and grow. Keep the bed reasonably weeded, because garlic does not compete well with weeds. If you planted hardneck, in early summer you will see the curly scape form. Cut it off and eat it. Removing the scape sends the plant's energy into the bulb instead of a flower, which gives you a bigger head.

Harvest comes in summer, usually around July in zone 7, when the lower leaves start to brown but the plant is not dead yet. Dig the heads instead of pulling, let them cure, and you have garlic from the ground you planted.

Mistakes beginners make

• Planting tiny cloves. You get tiny bulbs. Save the big cloves for the ground.
• Planting tip down. The shoot has to turn around, which wastes energy and can delay or ruin the clove.
• Planting too shallow or too deep. Both cause trouble; aim for the one to two inch depth and adjust for your zone.
• Letting the bed stay wet all winter. Garlic rots, not grows, in a puddle.
• Planting grocery garlic that was treated to not sprout. Buy seed garlic.
• Skipping mulch in a cold zone. Mulch keeps the cloves from heaving out of the soil.
• Waiting until spring and expecting a full crop. You will get something, but fall is the season that makes it.

Start with one bed

You do not need a garlic patch the size of a pasture. Even a modest bed gives you bulbs all winter and enough to replant. Because garlic replants itself from the biggest heads, your first $10 of seed garlic can become a free supply for years.

Get the order right: choose hardneck or softneck, buy seed garlic, plant after the calendar says late October, put it to bed under mulch, and let winter do what garlic needs. Next July you will be pulling heads out of the ground wondering why you did not start sooner.

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— C. Steward 🥕