Grey Duck Garlic, growing garlic organically

How Much Garlic Should I Buy? How to Calculate Garlic Yield.

How much hardneck garlic do you need to plant?

If you want to harvest*:

  • 10 pounds of garlic, plant 2-3 pounds of garlic
  • 25 pounds of garlic, plant 5-7 pounds of garlic
  • 50 pounds of garlic, plant 10-12 pounds of garlic
  • 100 pounds of garlic, plant 20-25 pounds of seed garlic
  • 200 pounds of garlic, plant 40-50 pounds of seed garlic
  • 500 pounds of garlic, plant 100-125 pounds of garlic

Chesnok Red garlic bulbs by yellow lily blooms by Susan Fluegel at Grey Duck Garlic

Picture: A trio of sweet Keeshond Red garlic bulbs under a yellow lily flower.

*These yields assume good growing conditions. New growers may want to hedge their bets and plant more garlic; seasoned garlic growers will be able to estimate from their previous growing seasons' garlic yield.

More About Seed Garlic Yields:

Hardneck garlic multiples by 400-600%. Softneck garlic multiples by 600-1000%. This means:

  • If you plant 10 pounds of hardneck garlic you should harvest between 40-60 pounds of garlic.*
  • If you plant 10 pounds of softneck garlic you should harvest between 60-100 pounds of garlic.*

 

* Your yield will depend on growing conditions, garlic variety, how much you weed, clove size, the greenness of your thumb, and weather. In particular, poor draining soil will stunt garlic size. It is possible to harvest less than you plant if the variety is unsuitable, weeds run rampant, or growing conditions are poor.

Grey Duck Garlic Personal Crop Yields:

Grey Duck Garlic's estimated yield by variety for 10 pounds of seed garlic. These are our personal yields averaged over several years. Garlic yields are with very large cloves, ideal growing conditions, great draining soil, low weed populations and expert garlic growers.

New garlic growers should expect lower yields at first unless they have a super green thumb (follow our guidelines above for how much garlic to plant). See our garlic planting guide or growing big garlic guide for ways to improve bulb yield and size.

Yield per 10 pounds of seed garlic:

  • Georgian Crystal, Parvin and Chesnok Red: 60-70 pounds
  • Siberian, Bogatyr and Red Rezan: 65-80 pounds
  • Romanian Red and German Red: 55-70 pounds
  • Asian Tempest: 45-60 pounds
  • Thermadrone and Lorz Italian: 90-110 pounds

Growing Organically!