If you planted garlic last fall, it should just about be ready for harvesting. When the lower two leaves on each plant are brown, it's time to pull them up and place them in a sheltered area to dry.
My husband Bill is a garlic aficionado and always grows a few different varieties in his ongoing quest for the very best garlic. He pulled up our garlic plants a couple of days ago and has groups of each variety hanging in our woodshed.
He says that if you leave the plants in the ground too long, the main stem won't dry and the cloves won't have that papery skin covering the bulbs. It usually takes about a month for the plants to completely dry, then you can remove the stems and store the garlic for use later.
One other interesting tidbit about garlic is that if you end up with way more garlic cloves than you can use, consider dehydrating some of it. That's what Bill has done with part of our harvest the past 2 years. He dries the cloves in our dehydrator (boy, did that ever stink up our garage!), then pulverizes them in the food processor to make the most delicious garlic powder. I know, it would be easier to buy garlic powder in the grocery store but I am absolutely certain it won't taste as good.
