Garlic Garden

 

A garden reserved for garlic, to ward off the vampires! Fall is garlic-planting season. The new raised bed now holds over 300 cloves. Each mature clove will grow to a bulb by next summer, but first we harvest green scapes in the Spring-that would otherwise steal nutrients from the bulb below ground.

We created a separate space for baby bulbils (garlic seed)-that will take two years to reach maturity. The bulbils offer us more varieties than grocery-store garlic and once harvested as bulbs in year two, we can continue the cycle of plant-harvest-plant without purchasing in the future. Garlic is the gift that keeps on giving!!

We have yet to grow enough stock to store plus plant our own cloves-so we purchased from local farmers roadside stands. Approx 40 bulbs gave us 300+ cloves. The kids pull apart the bulbs by hand (or teeth!) before we plant and cover with a straw blanket for the winter. These will be the first signs of Spring-with small grass-like growth as early as April.