How to Know When Garlic Is Ripe?

Garlic develops the best bulbs when provided with a long growing season. Fall planting gives the bulbs the entire winter, spring and summer season to produce large, flavorful cloves. Unlike other members of the allium family, such as onions, garlic develops the best bulbs when allowed to flower before harvest. The flowering cycle provides hints to the maturity of the bulbs but it's still necessary to sacrifice at least one garlic bulb to test the maturity of the rest of the crop.

Things You'll Need

• Trowel
• Knife

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Instructions

1. • 1

     Inspect the garlic plants in late summer after the plants finish flowering. The lower leaves begin yellowing on the garlic plant once the bulbs are ready for harvest.

   • 2

     Dig around one plant with a trowel. Dig below the level of the bulb and slide the trowel beneath it, lifting the bulb from the ground.

   • 3

     Cut the bulb in half, separating the root end and the stem end of the bulb. The garlic bed is ready for harvest if the cloves are visibly separated but don't fall apart.