Child of the Planet

This is the first year that I’ve got all my ‘shits in a row’. Ground is prepped Mulch is chewed Garlic has cooled it’s heels in the fridge. And it’s all ready a month earlier than the traditional ‘shortest day of the year’ when I usually plant my garlic crop. It’s been an epic journey so here are some links for speed bring up too... This is my first crop of anything in this bed. Read about it’s construction here  finishing-raised-garden-build I’ve spent a year developing the soil in this bed making-soil-update Where I wake up the garden bed for this years crop  garlic-week-day-one Huge load of mulch created  garlic-week-day-two Finally some garlic action  garlic-week-day-three Break in work for rain  garlic-week-day-four Over the last couple of days there’s been a final application of ash and coffee grounds      I’ve raked the soil to break up clumps and dry it out a bit.      Pulled the garlic out of the fridge Planted the cloves a...

It was a chilly start to the day but by the time I had finished the planting, the air was bright and warm. Moved the crop back to the front yard this year ( read here about last years crop ). I'm hoping the break has cleansed the soil of rust spores. Most people I know have already planted out their garlic in an effort to reduce the impact of rust. I was intending to plant at the beginning of the month but time got away from me. Click here to see the history of garlic on the property... I like to lay out the cloves first to better judge spacing and coverage. Then I press them down into the soil. There are three patches established. One is with the best of last years crop, the second is with some garlic that I had stored in the garage ( read about it here... ) The third little patch is for some stiff stalked variety that a mate gave me to try. This is the first year I haven't bought seed garlic. I'm hoping that the bulbs I've saved from last year 'do the...

For the first time, on the the longest day of the year, I didn’t spring out into the garden and pull the bulbs out from the ground ( click here to see last years harvest ). This harvest season, I waited until the green leaves had begun to wilt. This first patch is the garlic I purchased from Moa valley.     Parts of the bed are wilting, but the elephant garlic is still green.     I got halfway through the garlic that I’ve been keeping for seed from last years harvest, when I realised that this garlic might still be growing.     If you can't see the video, click here

This years garlic has been under cover since planting. The aim is to protect it from the winter westerlies, and to see if it has an effect on rust. A few plants have ended up growing outside the cover and I'm using these as a 'control' to see if there is any difference.     When I took the covers off, the first thing I noticed was that the plants have been bent by the cover. I'm thinking of buying taller frames for next year. There is a bad patch of rust halfway down the bed. Planted here was a small group of stiff neck variety. Each year that I've grown garlic, the rust mainly hits in December, so it doesn't have a big impact on the growth of the garlic. None of the garlic that was outside the cover was effected by rust. The rest of the crop is looking good, but the rust is spreading out from that small patch in the middle.    I pruned off infected leaves and burnt them.    

Well, if I was a god fearing man, I’d be cursing him/her/it because it rained on Friday. It’s now Monday and it’s still raining, so I guess I now have to call it, ‘garlic fortnight’. I can plant the garlic this week and still be ahead of the curve for a change. The ‘venerable old gardener’ I was talking to last week reckons seven days in the fridge for garlic, and that it doesn't mind fresh horse shit, so just before the rain set in this morning I collected a trailer load

Last year's garlic crop was pretty disastrous, and I almost didn’t want to give it another try…. But here we are. I bought some new seed from Te Mata garlic. Three different varieties. Kept the seed in the fridge for a couple of weeks and waited for a string of sunny days to appear. Planted it all out, and covered it with a layer of mulch. A couple of days later, I planted out some of the best of the garlic that was left over from last year's debacle.

After a decent growing season, I had issues with leaving some of my garlic in the ground for a bit too long. Previous posts... dug-up-last-of-garlic-today started-harvesting-garlic-today I'm still happy with the results and looking forward to next winter when I lay down a new crop of cloves. This is my seed for next year This is to eat Video summary of the harvest Click here if you don't see the video above

Sometimes I get the impression that this place runs on garlic. We consume a lot of it here, and it's all grown on the property. Some people pop cloves like its candy, I participated in a couple of big garlic planting sessions. A bed of compost is laid down, into which the cloves are pressed, about a hand-width apart. All the little cloves are then blanketed in a thick layer of mulch. This keeps them warm and inhibits the weeds. I've heard said, that garlic should be planted on the shortest day, and harvested on the longest. This isn't a rule that's followed here on the farm. Shoots were poking up through the mulch with in a couple of weeks. Huge bed that we planted

Last winter the dreaded ‘rust’ spread an orange patina through the robust green leaves of my first garlic crop. It was a pretty epic planting, filling out most of two, seven meter beds.    Though the bulbs were nice and plump, all of them eventually succumbed to the rust. I couldn’t use any of it for seed. This year I'm planning in a new crop out the back to get some environmental separation. This spot between the banksias will be a second saffron plot next year... … But this year I'm going to plant garlic This square on the other side of the path was going to be asparagus, but I’ll fill it with garlic, and continue to develop the permanent asparagus bed for next year. As soon as I plant something out the back, the neighbours chickens want to dig it up to have a look. I’ve laid down boards and covered the naked dirt with ash to discourage their excavations. The fungus hit most of New Zealand pretty hard. Some seed outlets have been forc...