Garlic

First garlic harvest

Well, I planted garlic last year in 3 plantings, 2 weeks apart. The result was over 100 garlic plants.  I bought the garlic from the local farmers market and although some was music (or advertised as), I did not know the name of some of the others. I was keen to have a local strain and see what grew well for me as well as see when was the best time to really plant. I had heard everything from end of October to end of November and now I know.


Today I started to harvest some. The idea, again is to do a little every week to pick the best time to harvest. The first leaf was dead and the second starting to yellow. The end of November garlic plants where the largest, yet the bulbs were not necessarily any bigger. The garlic bread may make my neighbors move though, if I don't cause a drought drinking so much. I got up twice last night for water.

Now my plants are all being chewed on by so many creatures I about ready to scream. In particular all the rain has brought thousands of pill bugs. After looking at the price of diatomaceous earth in the garden center, I stumbled on it at a farm feed store. They feed it to cows? Well, no idea if its exactly the same, but the bag was huge and price right, so today I liberally coated the garden with diatomaceous earth. I hope it does not rain for a day and perhaps I know. Anyone tried farm feed diatomaceous earth?

Lastly I planted a 2 seed trays. One with mixed vegetables to replace the space of the garlic and the second Alyssum. Its not a flower I love, but it feeds beneficials. I clearly have cabbage worms and many white butterfly's flapping everywhere and found a couple large caterpillars. One green and one brown. The robin on my deck got the brown one.