Anyone have any ideas why this happened?

Overwatering or too much rain causing root rot? You don't give much info about growing conditions. And it helps to know your general location or at least your hardiness zone.

Rodney

I live in the Kansas City area. I haven't been doing any watering yet. The area it's in is pretty well drained and overall we had a pretty dry winter. Since spring we had several rains over an inch and a couple of weeks ago we had a 5 day stretch where it rained a total of 6 inches.

What are they mulched with, perhaps that is the problem? Can't tell if it is grass clippings or pine needles or ? Pine needles might make the soil too acidic, the grass clippings could heat up too much and make the plants dry out? Just trying to figure something out without a lot of data. Good luck!

It is mulched with grass clippings that were already dry. It is from zoysia that I cut short in early spring while it was still dormant. I did have a soil test done this spring and the PH tested a little high 7.3 if I remember correctly. P and K are plentiful. N is a little low.

Our weather here in KC has been pretty good for garlic this year. We only had one dry spell this spring but it didn't last long. I haven't watered mine at all this year nor in the last 2 prior years. Have you been feeding them regularly with any nitrogen? If not, that may be the problem. I use a light sprinkling of urea before rain about every 2 weeks from late February until early May.

Do you know what type they are? Have you grown the same type before? It looks like the scapes are ready to be harvested.

I have found that the type of garlic you plant has a lot to do with performance. Some types grow best in certain areas. I've once tried supermarket garlic for fun and it produced plants like yours. Now I go for the types sold in the local garden center, although more expensive, and from the local organic farmers markets (locally grown). I use no grass unless it's composted, and I fertilize once or twice with liquid fertilizer. I also use composted manure as a mulch. Plants are really big with those methods.

Trial and error over the years... oh, and I leave one plant over from each year to grow the next year and they produce multiple bulbs. What a kick.

You need to cut off those scapes (flower stems) so the plant can put energy into the bulb. Eat them. They're delicious.

I fertilized them once this spring. I don't know what the variety is. If I remember correctly I used ones from super market several years ago and just keep replanting in the fall from the ones I grew that year.

It could be a virus buildup in your garlic strain. Garlic are heavy nitrogen feeders. Too late for this year but I would feed them much more than you did this year.

I would consider buying some new seed garlic at a local farmers market in late July or August. I think you are on the KS side so I can't help on what markets would be your best bet in your area but I know that their is a vendor at the Brookside market that has at least a half dozen hardneck varieties and an elderly vendor at the Lee's Summit market that has Music and German White.