Grey Duck Garlic

Growing Garlic the Grey Duck Garlic Way

The Complete and Easy Guide to Growing Gorgeous Giant Garlic

We don't sell garlic but we can show you how to grow it! Learn from our years of growing great garlic.

This site contains everything you ever wanted to know about garlic but were afraid to ask; selecting the perfect variety, planting cloves, tending green plants and ultimately harvesting huge heads of garlic. We have over a hundred pages on growing and selling garlic and other garlic related information!

If you want to grow huge heads of garlic you are looking at the right place! We are garlic experts who grew organic garlic for seed sales for many years. I have hand planted and harvested thousands of pounds of garlic and learned through doing. Although we no longer sell garlic we want to continue to share our knowledge with you.

As an added bonus you can also read odd bits of garlic lore and the legitimate health benefits of garlic. Did you know garlic might prevent wrinkles while warding off drug resistant MRSA?). Can your beauty cream do that while still making a mean linguini sauce? I bet not!

Our latest venture is pollinator research. We have a whole section on this website about bees and other pollinators. Learn how to help our friendly pollinators the bees! Bonus: learn how to tell a bee from a wasp.

 

More about the garlic website:

FAQ:

Do you have burning questions about garlic? Check here for the answers to our most common allium queries.

About us:

Curious about what type of people would write about garlic? Here are pictures and stories about us like how we got our name.

Growing garlic guides:

These pages offers garlic information for the home gardener and for commercial growers. For new garlic growers and gardeners we offer our First Time Garlic Grower's Guide. There is a page just for Southern growers. We have guides for growing the biggest garlic bulbs, raising the smallest garlic bulbs, growing green garlic and growing with garlic bulbils.

Garlic growing tips:

Picture: Want huge bulbs? See our Grow Big Garlic page for how to grow giant garlic bulbs like the ones at right!

Decide what garlic variety is best for your climate and how much to plant. Check out our garlic planting chart for when to put those cloves in the ground and handy tips for garlic storage once you grow those bulbs.  If you are really interested in garlic you can read about a garlic breeding program.

Garlic marketing:

Check out our marketing tips and learn about green garlic. If you are thinking about growing garlic for sale see our tips on navigating the local farmer's market. We also give some tips for women growers.

Farmer's Market and CSA Garlic Growers: We have information on selecting garlic varieties and how to determine how much seed clove you need. Growing garlic can be very profitable if you go about it the right way and we want to encourage new garlic farmers. We quit growing garlic because we wanted to pursue farm research not because selling garlic wasn't profitable.

Garlic cookbook:

Discover the range of flavors garlic can offer! Our cooking pages offer flavor sketches and gourmet recipes to suit each garlic variety. See our tips for what garlic varieties compliment different ethnic dishes. Check out our garlic cooking tips.

Why garlic can make you healthier.

There has been an explosion of great new research in the last few years showing why eating garlic is health. See our mini-scientific articles on how garlic can reduce skin aging and wrinkles, how eating garlic and onions prevents hip osteoarthritis, how garlic can change your genes, and why garlic inhibits inflammation and helps with arthritic symptoms.

Worried about cardiovascular disease? Check out our sections garlic helps firefighter's heart health, how garlic lowers blood pressure, and why garlic lowers blood sugar and reduces cholesterol.

We have garlic references and facts about garlic and good health and garlic's historical use in medicine.

Garlic kills germs:

So if you are interested in how garlic can fight off infections and invading microbes see our pages on using garlic to cure MRSA, how garlic obliterates food poisoning bacteria, why garlic inhibits TB, and how garlic may be used to protect baby formula from pathogen contamination.

Garlic enhances nutrition:

Garlic helps you get more nutrition from food by regulating iron metabolism and letting you absorb more zinc and iron from grains and lentils.

Garlic information:

Attend a fun garlic festival, find out whether you should feed your pets garlic, read about the history of garlic, find out the difference between a hardneck and a softneck garlic, or study the ten garlic families.

Garlic follies:

Follow our garlic on a photo shoot, learn about the art of Grey Duck Garlic, see if you have what it takes to be a garlic dog or read our tales of Women vs. Weeds.  Check out the page listing depression symptoms (did you know losing your sense of smell could signal that you are depressed?) I also review a great book on overcoming and living with depression,500 Tidbits of Insight by D. Delaughter.

Fun garlic facts:

Find out how to alleviate garlic breath, read about the rise of garlic smugglers, learn how garlic is combating toxic waste and check out a new species of garlic.

Garlic varieties: 

Read about garlic varieties in general and get up close with a personal expose of some of our favorites garlic celebrities: Georgian Crystal, Siberian, Romanian Red, Parvin, Lorz Italian, German Red, Red Rezan, Thermadrone, Tzan, Asian Tempest, Chesnok Red and Bogatyr. We love all these varieties and encourage you to try a new variety this year!

All About Bees:

Do you like honey? How about fruits and vegetables? Our bee section has been expanded to let you know more about the plight of the bees and how you can help plant pollinators. Pollinators are a vital part of the ecosystem.

Learn about bee families, why you should never call a bee a wasp, and how pesticide exposure can cause bees to lose their way, stop dancing, and become couch potatoes. Not fond of wasps? Learn how to control wasps organically.

Sustainable practices:

At Grey Duck Garlic we give a duck about the environment! Learn about how we take care to live and grow in ways that improve the land. Find out how to weed like a pro! Teach your cow to eat weeds, learn about ways to attract wildlife to your yard and find out why we didn't use chemicals when we grew garlic.

Gardening:

Check out our seed planting guide or learn about kitchen gardens, square foot gardens or container gardens.

We encourage you to grow your own garlic.

Seed garlic varieties are great tasting and easy to grow for the home gardener, commercial grower, and chef. Gourmet garlic has a much wider range of flavor than supermarket garlic. You will not believe the difference in taste!

 

More about us:

Grey Duck Garlic is a family farm that lovingly grows certified organic crops (WSDA Organic Certification #1883). Growing organically is better for us, the land, and the flavor of our produce. Whether you have a city lot or a 2,000 acre farm you can start making the steps to grow in a way that is healthier. 

We use sustainable growing practices. We believe that the best tasting food comes from thoughtful and respectful production.

Our new venture is on-farm research. We currently have a WSARE grant about pollinator habitat. We will be reporting the results on the website later!

Our family:

Steve loves growing tomatoes. His farm, Plow Maker Farms, provides organic heirloom tomatoes and raspberries to the local area. If you want to know why heirloom tomatoes are healthier and tastier than commercial tomatoes check out this article.

Jane, is very interested in small fruit and berry production. She is experimenting with different varieties. She selected all the beautiful cut flowers we are using in our pollinator study.

I (Susan) am currently writing several books and a review article with a friend about metabolic disorders. I helped a New York Company, Choopoons, develop a healthy, no added sugar, no major food allergen, vegan salad dressing that everyone at the table can use.

If you love yogurt, ice cream and cream check out my website discussing the health benefits of dairy at MooScience.

Our website

This website is created and designed by Susan Fluegel. My current goal with this website is to develop a useful resource for garlic growers and cooks that is also entertaining. It is a work in progress and I am continually trying to improve it. Any mistakes made on this website are all mine (remember: without mistakes one cannot learn)!

All content on this website is original and written by Susan Fluegel, Edna Hastain or Jane Fluegel. We do not copy or use material from other sources. Photos are taken by Susan Fluegel, Patty Fluegel, or Jane Fluegel. Pictures, art and cartoons are by Susan Fluegel or Jane Fluegel. You are welcome to pin Grey Duck Garlic photos and pictures on your favorite sharing sites if you include credit (don't worry we won't sue you for thousands of dollars!)

We like to spread the garlic gospel! If you wish to use or post written articles from Grey Duck Garlic please contact us by e-mail. We normally are happy to give permission as long as we are given credit.

Contact Jane or Susan at:

We don't sell organic garlic anymore; we just want to help you grow it!