When spring came, the garlic greens appeared. As summer progressed, the greens eventually died back. I knew soon enough that I had missed the prime time to harvest my first ever planting of garlic, but my summer had struck a difficult balance as I was attempting to not overdue things and stay rested with the little one that I am carrying.
Because of this, my garlic continued to rest in the garden soil.
As I have needed garlic this year, I have dug what my recipes call for. And as the seasons changed to fall, the greens of my garlic reappeared - reminding me just how many bulbs remained from my planting last fall.
Today I headed out to the garden to gather tomatoes and peppers that are tempting the first frost to come. While in the garden, I caught a glimpse of my garlic greens again, tempting me to dig them up.
Although I had decided that my work in the garden was done after the Farm Crawl, to be replaced with a more restful pace and preparation for our little one to arrive in the next few weeks, the call of garlic got the best of me. So I slowly and carefully dug up my garlic.
As I mentioned, this was my first attempt at planting garlic. Because of this, I haven't gathered much knowledge when it comes to garlic growing . . . but I'm guessing that digging garlic when it has started to regrow again isn't the best for flavor or storage. Even so, I am hoping that it will at least be better than no garlic.
After I dug my garlic, I brought it in the house. There was quite a bit of mud on them so I broke apart the cloves, cleaned them off, and divided them into two piles. (I'm sure I would have been better off digging them when it was drier and leaving the cloves together - but they they probably never would have been dug. ) The first pile that contained the larger cloves was braided and hung up to dry. The pile with the smaller cloves was put into a breathable produce storage bag in the fridge, in hopes that they can be replanted this fall (maybe after Baby is born??) for some sort of garlic harvest next year (Yeah, I know I'm probably supposed to plant the bigger cloves - but I wanted to use these this year, especially not knowing if I will be able to replant.) Trial and error is common here on our beginning farm, and with this garlic growing attempt there was probably as much error in my trial as any. I'm sure there are probably garlic experts out there chuckling at me, especially when I have Google at the tip of my fingers telling me what I could do or should have done at this point. I won't feel offended though if comments are shared to guide me in future garlic growing attempts, and I'd much rather here from my blog friends than from Google anyway. :)
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2 comments:
this is my favorite part of both the blog & the podcast! you folks keep it real. you share what you are trying, how you think it will work or how it won't and then you post about the end result. awesome!
Your blog is very inspiring. I like to blog as well, but cannot keep up with. With all the work you do with the farm, the house, and the kids, I am very impressed by the fact that you still have time to blog. I would like to buy pork from your farm and I talked to your husband about it. I think he added me to the list for January. I would like to start feeding my young family with healthy food and cut down on processed food. I started gardening a little as well after reading many blogs. I would like to blog about it to share my experience with other novices but can keep up with it. Becca you are very inspiring! I read blogs a lot, but it could be my first time commenting one.
May God Bless you, your Family and the farm.
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