Shallots and garlic

We are growing shallots from seed for the first time ever. We started the seeds in soil blocks on a heat mat on2/26. The seeds germinated in our basement before moving to the hoop house and finally being transplanted on 3/30 and 4/7 outside. They were in for a rough start getting in the ground that early and it was touch and go for a while, but they rebounded and have looked lovely ever since. The tops are starting to brown, a sign they are nearing harvest, and the bulbs look decent. I am hoping they flesh out a bit more and will post pics following harvest. Would love to hear from anyone if you have experience growing shallots.

We have also grown a bunch of garlic again this year, but unfortunately, it did not fare quite as well. Due to the hot spring and our own busyness, we failed to harvest all of the scapes. We have read that harvesting scapes helps the bulb grow bigger, but our garlic guide, Growing Great Garlic, says this has not been the case with the garlic he has grown. In any case, the garlic bulbs are much smaller than we had hoped they would be. We also harvested a few weeks earlier than we did last year.