GARLIC PLANTING GUIDE

When to Plant Garlic in Quebec

Fall planting dates for Montreal, Laval, Gatineau, Trois-Rivières, Quebec City and Sherbrooke, and how to get the cloves through a Quebec winter.

When to plant garlic in Quebec is late September to late October. Around Montreal, aim for October 1–20. Further north and up in the Eastern Townships, where the first frost comes in mid-September, plant in the first half of that window.

The rule behind the date is the same everywhere: get the cloves in a few weeks before the ground freezes hard. Early enough that roots form, late enough that no green shoot comes up before winter.

Quebec Cities: First Frost and Zone

The first fall frost is the useful anchor: the earlier it comes where you live, the earlier in the window you plant. Here is each city, from the latest frost to the earliest:

The frost dates are Environment and Climate Change Canada normals. We do not publish a separate window for each city: soil freezes on its own schedule, not a fixed number of days after the first air frost, and a precise date we cannot back up would be false precision.

Montreal, Laval and the Outaouais

The island and the south shore get the longest fall in the province. October 1–20 suits most gardens here, and a mild year can stretch to the end of the month. Gatineau’s first frost falls in early October, close to Montreal’s, so the same window works across the river from Ottawa.

Ontario’s garlic factsheet notes garlic is sensitive to drought all season, especially while the bulb is swelling, so water a raised bed through a dry June.

Quebec City, Trois-Rivières and the Eastern Townships

Sherbrooke has the earliest average first frost of these six cities, in mid-September, and Quebec City follows at the end of the month. Plant in late September or the first days of October so roots have time to form.

Snow is an ally here. Ontario’s factsheet recommends sites where a good snow cover builds up, sheltered from wind, because snow insulates the soil. A bed along a fence or a hedge where drifts collect does better than an open, windswept spot.

Depth, Spacing and Mulch

Plant the largest cloves, pointed end up, 5–7 cm deep. Ontario’s factsheet suggests 7–12 cm between plants depending on bulb size, and at least 20 cm between rows. Cloves planted upside down still grow, but the stems curve and the bulbs come out misshapen.

Cover the bed with 10–15 cm of straw after planting. Mulch evens out soil temperature through the freeze and thaw of late fall and early spring. Use clean straw, not hay, so you do not bring in weed seed or garlic pests.

Which Garlic to Plant

Hardneck garlic is the safe choice in Quebec. Ontario’s factsheet describes hardneck types as generally hardier, with bigger cloves, though they keep for less time than softneck. The University of Saskatchewan advises against planting grocery-store garlic: it may carry disease, may not suit a cold climate, and is sometimes treated so it will not sprout.

See garlic varieties for Canada for the types.

Planting Too Early or Too Late

Too early, and a warm fall brings shoots up above the soil, where winter damages them. The University of Saskatchewan warns of exactly this. Too late, and the cloves do not root well before the ground freezes, which leaves them less hardy.

Ontario’s factsheet adds a disease reason not to plant early: clove rot from blue mould is worse when garlic goes into warm soil at the end of summer.

En français : Quand planter l’ail au Québec, with first frost dates for every Quebec city in our data.

Frequently Asked Questions

Sources

• Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Agribusiness — Garlic production factsheet
• University of Saskatchewan, Gardening at USask — Garlic
• Environment and Climate Change Canada — Canadian Climate Normals (the frost dates in the tables, read from this site’s frost data)