[svalli]

The spring planted hardnecks are an unkown Russian variety, Spanish Morado and Polish Ornak. Softnecks are French Sabadrome and Therador.

I planted all of these also last fall plus some others. There are over 400 cloves planted in a bed, which is covered with black plastic mulch. Softneck named Messidor did year ago well as fall planted, so I did not save any of that variety for spring planting. I ordered Elephant garlic and three hardneck varieties (Moravian Giant, Mikulow Wight and Topinky) from the Isle of Wight and planted all of those already last fall. Now I think that I should have saved half of the cloves for spring planting to make sure that I do not loose the new varieties, if they do not survive the winter. Maybe next weekend we will have time to drive out to the country side and I can check, if the garlic is coming up.

I do not know, if planting directly to ground in the spring would work here, because it takes so long for the ground to thaw enough for planting and then the growing season would be shorter. The rootrainers seem to work perfectly for starting the garlic, before it can be planted in ground. I will also use the black plastic on the bed where these will be planted. I make X-shape slits on the plastic before spreading it on the ground. It takes a bit more work during planting time, but makes weeding much easier and also retains moisture in the ground.

Sari