Hello. I grew Music for a few years though it did not do well for me. If you let the scapes mature on the plant, the garlic bulbs will be smaller. However, you can cut the scapes from the plant and put some of them in water and they will continue to mature.

The scapes are also really good grilled or made into pesto. They can also be chopped up and sauteed with eggs, or even used like chives in other dishes.

The scapes produce bulbils, not seeds. The bulbils can be grown but you will not get large bulbs with multiple cloves in one year. You will likely get a "round". It is like a single large round clove. Less likely is a small bulb with small cloves. Both can be used or replanted and grown for another year to produce more "normal" sized bulbs with multiple cloves.

Cindy's advice about about scapes and harvest time are very good and similar to my experiences. The only thing I would add is that Music grew well for me in Michigan. The plants have grown larger than other varieties and tend to mature just a bit later.

Okay, so I don't want the scapes to mature, I want to harvest the bulbs sooner. So how do you tell when it's time to harvest? Is it a certain date? Is it the appearance of the plant? I will try that suggestion to cut the scape and put them in water to mature, but I think I might leave one plant to mature on the plant.

If I understand you right nature girl, If the scapes mature, I can plant them, in the Fall? Spring? Let them grow another season, harvest them and plant again and then they will be normal size? So almost like a biennial plant that you start plants two years in a row to get continual bloom?

I find it pretty funny that I struggle with something that seems to be so easy to grow. I never get useable garlic bulbs. Either I forget to plant them at the right time, or don't harvest them at the right time, or have trouble drying them out. I think garlic seems to be an afterthought for me. But I would really enjoy harvesting normal size garlic. Especially since I grow organically.

I just read up on this and they said when half of the leaves are dead is the time to harvest, so if there are 6-8 leaves in total, I would harvest when 3-4 of the lower leaves are completely dead. That's my plan!

Linda

If you don't want to plant the bulbils that grow on the scape, then just cut the scapes off and eat them (if they aren't woody already). It generally takes about 3 years to get normal sized bulbs from bulbils.

You plant the bulbils in the fall just as you would a regular clove of garlic. Although you plant them shallower and can plant them closer together as the size of the plants will be smaller. The following summer you generally get a small round, a single little clove that didn't split into a head. Depending on the size of the bulbils you may get some mini bulbs that are about an inch in diameter (the cloves are really small in these). In the fall you replant the rounds/mini cloves and harvest the small heads the following summer (they'll probably be about an inch and a half to two inches). Replant the cloves from these small bulbs in the fall and the next summer you will have regular, large bulbs to harvest (2.5 inches or so). Hopefully you can follow that word salad. haha

Growing from bulbils is fun to do if you have the extra space to make the years long investment. However, it's a lot less time consuming and easier to just plant from regular cloves.

Cutting the scapes won't cause the bulb to mature earlier. Nor does leaving the scapes to continue growing make any noticeable difference in bulb size. At least in my experience. You harvest the bulbs when about half the leaves on the plants have yellowed/died.

I think some people have trouble growing garlic because they think of it as a root crop. While the bulbs do grow underground, the leaves of the plant directly affect the size of the bulb you will get. I prefer to think of garlic and other alliums as leaf crops because they need a higher amount of nitrogen than traditional roots like carrots and beets. Planting at the wrong time (in spring) is another reason for small bulbs.

My birthday is October 13th so that is generally around the time I plant garlic. Although I have also planted in mid November one year and that late planting did just as well as any other year.

Rodney

Rodney, that was very clear and understandable.

Thank you all, now I feel better informed on how to manage the garlic. I definitely don't give them any extra fertilizer and maybe that would help too. I think I would enjoy trying the bulbils, but I think I will try to grow the cloves to get a quicker result too. The year before last, I waited too long to look and all the Music was sold out when I went to order, but hopefully, I'll be on time this year.

Has anyone any experience with Music and whether the bulbs are the same, worse, better, than other garlic? Taste different, different size?

Glad it was understandable. That one paragraph kinda went on and on. haha

Since you already have Music growing just save some of your bulbs for replanting in the fall. No need to buy more. I haven't actually grown garlic so I can't comment on the flavor or bulb size.

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/1717695/my-bulbil-experiment

There's a link to a discussion that I started on the allium forum years ago about bulbils. Unfortunately the photos I added are no longer visible for some reason and I have no idea where to even look for the originals. Also, it is important to note that in the link I used Carpathian and German Red, both are rocambole hardnecks which are known to produce really large bulbils. Music is a porcelain hardneck and I do know that their bulbils are much smaller than rocambloles. When you plant yours your experience will probably be a bit different than mine that first year and you will probably get many more rounds than I did.

Rodney

Rodney thanks for the link. Houzz usually loses the photos on old posts. I'll give it a try and hopefully may have something to come back and report on. :-)