Garlic Harvesting

 Garlic is normally harvested when the leaves start to turn brown, but my pumpkin vines pulled down my garlic stalks, so I decided to harvest early.

Harvesting is easy.  Just dig beneath the bulb, loosen the soil, and gently coax the entire plant from the earth.  Remove the larger clumps of soil from the root ball and bulb.


When you get everything out of the ground, hang the bulbs upside down and allow them to cure for a few weeks until everything is pretty well dried out.  The curing station should be out of the sun in a well ventilated area.  I used a wire shelf to hang the bulbs I harvested.

Once everything is dried out, you can trim the roots and leaves, or braid the leaves into a string of garlic.  It should store pretty well provided you keep it dry and relatively cool.

Lasagna Garden Bed Update

It has been over six months since I installed the lasagna garden bed in my yard.  The verdict?  Let's go to the tape... (Picture after the jump!)

Hugelkultur - Year One Update

Well, it is almost Summer here in Georgia, and my hugelkultur is almost 1.  I was so excited to see whether this thing actually works!  Results so far are mixed.  Let's go to the tape:

Garlic Update

Further to my post last fall regarding garlic, I took a couple shots yesterday of the garlic bed.

Look at these babies!  They grow up so fast.

You can already see some of the leaves are starting to wilt.  When about 1/3 to 1/2 of the stems are wilted, I will dig up the heads and set them out to dry.  I'll update this site to show my progress.

No Till Garden

This fall I managed to put in a no till garden bed (sometimes called "lasagna" or "layered" gardening).  The idea is to mimic the forest floor by stacking layers of carbon and nitrogen on top of one another up to two feet high.  The result is fertile soil for garden plants, and an environment that is naturally resistant to weed starts.  The garden will also hold a lot of water, which keeps watering at a minimum (an attractive feature in Georgia). 

The first step is to cover the garden area with cardboard or thick layers of newspaper.  I used a combination of both.  This base layer will keep any existing weeds from sprouting up in the springtime.  

From there, I added a layer of compost from my compost pit about two inches thick.  This was followed by a layer of wood chips that I had delivered for free off craig's list.  On top of that layer, I added some blood and bone meal, followed by grass clippings from my lawn.  I then added more wood chips, some composted cow manure, and another layer of wood chips.  The finished product was probably 11 inches high when completed.  Two months later, the garden has decreased in height by about 40%.  

I've read that using wood chips in a no till garden is less than ideal because it takes longer to break down, but like all my permaculture projects, this was done on a budget.  The only materials I paid for were the blood and bone meal, which I bought at the hardware store for around $20 total.  

I'll post pictures in the spring and provide an update on how things do here.  

   

A cross section of my lasagna bed after a couple months.  Looks pretty dark!  Much more attractive than the red Georgia clay that was there. 

A photo of the garden.  I used an inverted keyhole structure, which will allow me to plant the inside and outside loop of the path.  

Growing Garlic

Garlic is supposed to be one of the easiest plants to grow.  You just put the cloves in the ground and wait.  I've read plenty of articles about growing garlic at home, so I thought I'd give it a try.