When to Harvest Garlic Scapes

Emergence

• When garlic scapes begin to emerge from between the highest set of deep green, strapping leaves of the garlic plant, they are as tender as newly sprouted seedlings and can easily be eaten raw. Pick garlic scapes early in their growth cycle, and pick them in the hot afternoon sun so that the exposed area of the stem hardens off quickly and does not weep too much sap, which can weaken the plant.

Before They Curl

• Cutting just before the scapes curl is the most common garlic scape harvesting method. Cutting the garlic scape before it completes that first full circular curl maximizes the soft, edible part of the scape while minimizing the redirection of energy away from the garlic bulb production. Use the soft, green neck of the scape chopped fine in salads or blended with olive oil for a spread on crusty Italian bread. Garlic scapes can also be chopped and dried for later use.

Before They Mature

• The garlic bulb will still have plenty of energy if you wait to harvest the garlic scape before the false flower opens to bloom. While waiting to cut the scape means that the end nearest the leaves may be woody and needs to be cut off before use, this provides the advantage of being able to watch the wild roller-coasterlike shapes that garlic scapes develop. These curls and turns are not only fun to watch, but they help make garlic scapes a more marketable product for market growers. As long as your soil is rich and fertile, letting your garlic scapes take a full turn before cutting will only decrease bulb size by about 5 percent, the Washington State University Extension advises.

At Maturity

• Allowed to develop to maturity, near the time of harvesting the garlic bulbs in midsummer, the false flower at the end of the garlic scape will develop tiny bulbils, much like top-setting and wild onions do. You can wait until the garlic bulbils fully develop before harvesting your garlic scape to use the dramatic bulbil head dried in flower arrangements, or to plant the bulbils and grow more garlic. The garlic growers at Boundary Garlic Farm in British Columbia advise that there are advantages and disadvantages to growing garlic from bulbils. There are many more bulbils per head than there are cloves of garlic to replant, and the bulbils are free of potential soilborne diseases. The disadvantage is that it takes two or more growing seasons to produce a full-sized head of garlic from a bulbil.