Garlic: Your Essential Plant For The Garden and The Kitchen
As the shorstet day is quickly approaching and traditionally garlic is planted on the shortest and harvested on the longest……
I’m not always a traditional gardener and as in the previous two seasons have shown me following tradition doesn’t always work.
So, Garlic: Your Essential Plant For The Garden and The Kitchen
First season we had quite a wet summer but it was terribly warm which is a great breeding ground for the rust fungus, so though I had a great crop I now had rust on the property so would continue to get it no matter how and what I did.
So I thought if I planted a month early the following season then I could harvest a month earlier to try and keep out of that prime rust time frame.
But that didn’t work either as the bulbs were underdeveloped and I needed to keep them in the ground so were back in the time frame for rust.
I’ve sprayed with apple cider vinegar, I’ve tried diluted milk/water mix. I’ve tried planting them further apart for better airflow but now I’ve had rust it would seem I’ll always have it.
So I cut my losses and decided to not plant any this season, but the chef in me was saying “go on give it another go, you never know it could be the year”.
For me (the chef)garlic is one of the holy trinity for me -, onion, garlic and lemon the perfect flavour builder so it’s hugely important plant to get into the garden.
I begin a couple of weeks before I plan to plant the garlic by loosening the soil and spread a layer of horse manure and compost then on the day I spread a thick layer of garden soil over the whole bed.
Then I separate the cloves up to good fat cloves and the smaller ones for cooking with. You always want the larger ones because you need to start with the best to get the best.
Now this step I’m still not sure if it’s necessary but I still do it anyway. Soak the cloves in a mix of seaweed tonic diluted with water for an hour or so.
It’s important to get the spacing right for planting as the garlic needs a good air flow and in a bed that gets all day sun but it can tolerate semi shaded.
I work this out by using a plank of 4x4 as a row spacer and the I work on a hand space apart between each clove.
You could spread your plants over a couple different beds as garlic works as a great pest controller and this can alleviate the spread of rust over your entire crop if you do happen to get it.
I don’t mulch my garlic until I see it sprout because one year we had a partially wet winter and all the cloves rotted in the ground meaning I had to replant a month later so I held off till about mid-August and then it is a little painful but I spread out pea straw between the rows gently without disturbing the plants.
You don’t have to keep to the traditional garden rules, they aren’t set in stone and sometimes the season just isn’t working right so all I can say is go with flow, try and figure what’s going to work for you and your garden on the day.
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