Finnish Garlic?

[JenniSD]

Despite the frost on the ground at the moment and the increasingly dark days, I have been fantasizing about what goodies I will plant in the coming year. However, I seem to find an alarming lack of Finnish literature in English about gardening indoors. We live in a kerrostalo, so gardens aren't exactly an option for me unless I rent a plot in the communal gardens. So I need your help!

Garlic is something our household just can't eat without. I noticed recently that our little cloves of garlic in the kitchen bowl on the counter have started to throw out shoots, and it started my cogs working as to whether I should stick them in a bit of soil and see what happens. I don't want to waste perfectly good garlic, though if it goes fubar. The garlic we have is Asian single bulb/clove garlic. Apparently it's from a rather southern region, so sunshine and warmth is probably a must. Perhaps someone can tell me what kind of garlic varieties grow well in Finland, and how to grow it indoors.

We don't have a grow-lamp, and what with the new legislation on light bulbs, we probably won't be able to get one anytime soon. Nature's way I suppose from here on out.

Thanks in advance!

[ajl]

I seem to find an alarming lack of Finnish literature in English about gardening indoors.

I know they have material in English about indoor gardening by people other than Finns (who might prefer Finnish)...
E.g. http://www.windowfarms.org/
Seems like there should be options to find this stuff all over the place on this newfangled thing called the internet.

edit - I know the window farm thing is not workable seasonally here but it is cool

[Rosamunda]

I have a feeling that the garlic grown here needs a "cold" season in order to grow (like most bulbs eg daffodils and tulips, they need to freeze in the winter).

We plant ours in the autumn (outdoors) and forget about it until the end of the summer, so it is in the ground for about 10 months.

I have never tried to grow it indoors but if yours is sprouting now and you pot it up, it will probably just flower and then die. There is not enough sunlight for the bulb to get what it needs to grow.

But you could always try.

[JenniSD]

I did prowl around online for some info specifically about Finland.. I suppose I could expand the search to just "the north." There's just such a huge amount of literature about gardening in English (and focusing mostly on the US or the UK) that it eclipses anything useful about growing veggies and such indoors in Finland. I've lived here for almost four years now, and have trouble growing anything but begonias weirdly enough. Everything else dies. I even managed to kill mother-in-law-tongues. So much for being a tough plant.

I did however find a rather interesting PDF featuring native plants to Finland, or plants that have grown here for so long they are practically native. "Sand garlic" sounds rather unappetizing.

Thanks for the link, though! I will look into it.

[Upphew]

edit - I know the window farm thing is not workable seasonally here but it is cool

Just add some http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium-vap ... ure_sodium or plain old http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluorescent_lamp and just wait for the cops...

[Pursuivant]

Dunno about garlic, but theres been quite a lot of people gotten into growing chillies. South Estonia is good for greenhgouse tomatoes, cucumbers and chillies, south Finland is 50/60 you need to have the perfect location.