Winter Solstice and the garlic's in

It's the winter solstice today and I have planted the garlic. This year I was able to use the best bulbs from last year's harvest, so this is third-generation organic garlic.

Quantity-wise it seemed like the twenty I planted last year was in fact way too many. Will the eight I am planting this year be too few?

I have planted 3 in a row in the long patch leading up to the lemon tree outside the kitchen window, and the other 5 in a row where the two courgettes were last year. I learned last year that apparently I don't go out our front door enough to plant anything out there that needs daily inspection, so garlic should do nicely. The bulbs went in around 5cm deep, pointy-end up, and last year they took 2 to 3 weeks to sprout.

I did get black aphids on the garlic about three months in to the growing cycle last year, so I need to watch out for this and spray with Neem Oil - hopefully I'll do better at stopping the bugs establishing themselves.