Garlic may be my very favorite crop. Nothing else in the garden provides so much pleasure for so many months for so little effort.
Here's the prize: cured, trimmed and ready to be stored for the winter.
Garlic may be my very favorite crop. Nothing else in the garden provides so much pleasure for so many months for so little effort. Though the effort is minimal, the planning and timing are critical.
Garlic is unique in that it gets planted in late fall and harvested the following summer. Planting is super-easy and I’ll have another blog post about that later. If you want to get a sneak peek at how easy it is, check out this video from our friend Roger Dorian of Kitchen Gardens International.
If you want to plant garlic this fall, you need make sure to have a supply of garlic cloves on hand for planting. If you can get some locally-grown garlic from a nearby farmer or gardener, that’s the best option because it will be well-adapted to your growing area. Because it's often difficult to find garlic at local garden centers, consider ordering yours online. I originally bought my garlic from Johnny’s Selected Seeds in Maine. We also offer a terrific organic garlic collection that includes two varieties of garlic, giving you an opportunity to see which type you prefer.
Determining when garlic is ready to harvest is one of the trickiest parts about growing it. If you harvest too soon the cloves will be small and underdeveloped (certainly usable but not as big and plump as possible). If you wait too long, as the heads dry the cloves will begin to separate and the head won’t be tight and firm (also not a disaster, but the cloves will be more vulnerable to decay and drying out so they won't store as long).
Though it depends somewhat on the growing season and where you live, garlic is usually ready to harvest in late July. The slide show below, with photos from my own garden, shows what to watch for. Properly curing the heads is also important and you’ll see that below as well.
Harvesting Garlic
These photos are from our album on Flickr. For captions and more information, go to Flickr.
-Kathy LaLiberte Director of Gardening, Gardener's Supply
For me, digging potatoes is a top-10 gardening activity. It’s like a treasure hunt. Our booty this year: 83 lbs. of organic potatoes.
Our 83 lb. harvest of organic potatoes.
Earlier in the season I wrote about planting potatoes in a re-purposed, three-bay composting bin.
We had a very rainy year and the potato plants loved all that moisture. Most of them grew to almost 4 feet tall. The crop looked promising, but a funny thing about growing potatoes is that you don’t know for certain what you’re going to get until you dig them up.
By mid-August the plants were well past their prime. Snails and slugs had damaged the foliage and many of the stems were bent down onto the ground. The fact is, when potato plants are ready to harvest they always look awful. The tops wither and the foliage starts to brown. It's just not pretty.
Because late blight is rampant on the East Coast this year and it’s a disease that affects potatoes as well as tomatoes, I was eager to get my potatoes out of the ground before the leaves could become infected. In another year I might have waited another couple weeks until the foliage was totally dead.
We started by chopping off the foliage with hedge shears. This step isn’t necessary; it just made it easier to see what we were doing. The trickiest part about harvesting potatoes is to not puncture the tubers as you’re digging. Any tubers that get punctured or have their skin damaged should be eaten right away. You need to dig deep and come up under the tubers to loosen the soil and gently lift them.
We harvested as a team with one person using a garden fork to lift the soil and the other person on hands and knees, sifting through the soil for tubers. If you have a modest amount of potatoes to dig (under 100 lbs.), I find this is the best technique. This way I can make sure that I find even those tiny little quarter-size tubers (yum!). The white and red potatoes were relatively easy to spot in the soil, but the dark blue ones were nearly impossible to see, so we did it by feel.
For me, digging potatoes is a top-10 gardening activity. It’s like a treasure hunt. Above is a picture of our booty: 83 lbs. of organic potatoes. Watch the slide show to see the harvest.
P.S. Not having to dig for your potatoes is a big advantage to using a Potato Bin. When it’s time to harvest, you can just tip the bin over on its side and let the potatoes tumble right out!
Back in May, my friend was so enthusiastic about his vegetable garden. He and his family had filled a raised bed with fresh compost and soil and planted it with vegetables, using the Kitchen Garden Planner to help with spacing and plant choices.
And then came the summer of 2009.
The enthusiasm my friend had in May is gone now, overcome by soaking rain, pests, diseases, weeds and guilt. The carefully planted raised bed is a weedy patch and the vegetables have been eaten or mauled by neighborhood animals. Although he took the Grow What You Eat pledge, my friend won't make the goal of growing 10 pounds of his own food. "We got a few ounces of peas, but that's it."
My friend is not alone. All month I've been hearing stories of discouraged gardeners — especially folks who are trying it for the first time. Here in the Northeast, there are longtime gardeners who say this is the worst gardening season they've ever seen. Even the most expert market gardeners couldn’t outsmart the fungus Phytophthora infestans (late blight) and had to pull out their tomato plants before bringing a single ripe tomato to market.
But please, don't give up. Next year will be better. I promise. As you think about gardening in 2010, here are some things to consider:
Be realistic: How much time to you have for the garden? If you only have two or three hours a week, plant a small garden. My friend puts it this way: "Vegetable gardening is not so much about skill; it's about time. We had the best of intentions, but then life happened." With two kids in elementary school, time is limited. Next year, the garden may be simplified to a couple of Tomato Success Kits and a Salad Bag or two.
Plan ahead: Take what you've learned from this season and apply it to next year. If you know that deer are a problem in your neighborhood, come up with a plan. A word of advice from me on deer: fence. You may have to get creative. My friend Vicki outwitted the local woodchucks by growing her salad greens in hanging baskets. It isn't the dream garden she envisioned, but she gets the lettuce.
Ask around: The best gardening information comes "over the fence." Sure, you can learn a lot from online experts and read how-to articles, but the gardeners in your neighborhood know what works best in your area. Once you start asking around, you'll find that people love to talk about their gardens. And the advice is always free.
If your vegetable garden is bountiful this year, good for you. Remember to share. But if your 2009 garden isn't a success story, don't be discouraged. Do a reality check, make a plan for next season and remember that your most useful tool is persistence. It'll take your garden from bad to good ... from good to great.
Dahlias flourish in full sun and their vibrant colors are hard to beat, especially when planted large groups. Started from potato-like tubers in the spring, they start blooming by midsummer and reach their peak in the dog days of August, filling the gap between fading early summer annuals and fall-blooming asters and mums.
A mix of low-growing dahlias creates a colorful carpet under standard roses. Muckross Gardens, Killarney, Ireland.
Single-flowered orange dahlias blaze across a green landscape, drawing the eye toward the house. Oslo Botanical Gardens, Norway.
The blaze of color caught my eye from 100 yards away. Sandwiched between the lush lawn and a dark green hedge, the row of red-orange dahlias drew my eye like a magnet. The single, golden-centered blooms captured and reflected the colors of the yellow house and red-tiled roof behind them. Simple and stunning.
Dahlias flourish in full sun and their vibrant colors are hard to beat, especially when planted en masse. Started from potato-like tubers in the spring, they start blooming by midsummer and reach their peak in the dog days of August, filling the gap between fading early summer annuals and fall-blooming asters and mums.
The American Dahlia Society recognizes thousands of cultivars, from short window box pompons to 6-foot-tall giants with dinnerplate blooms. The society divides dahlias into classes based on the flower form, predominant color, and size. The flower form refers to the number, shape and arrangement of the petals. Some are long and needlelike, others short and rounded. Some flowers have a single row of petals around a button center, others resemble sea anemones or waterlilies. True blue is still elusive, but nearly every other flower color exists in the dahlia world, including bicolors and speckled blooms. Some even have bronzy foliage.
For mass plantings, I prefer cultivars that grow 12-24” high because they stand up to late summer wind and rain. Those with smaller flowers or fewer petals are also better for carefree landscapes. Taller dahlias, especially those with large flowers, often need support to keep their stems straight. These are perfect garden centerpieces, though, and they look great against a fence or trellis or among shrubs and fall-blooming perennials.
To truly appreciate the range of dahlia flower forms and colors, visit a dahlia society show or the floral display at a county or state agricultural fair this fall.
I used to grow enough corn that we could eat it for dinner every night during August and still have enough to freeze for winter. Once you've been eating home-frozen corn for a few years, it's difficult to be satisfied with store-bought.
It takes seven or eight ears worth of sweet corn to fill a one-quart freezer bag. So to get 25 quarts of frozen corn (the minimum amount I try to freeze each summer) you need to start with about 200 ears of corn.
It's a short, sweet season. While you can, take advantage of abundant, fresh corn.
I used to grow enough corn that we could eat it for dinner every night during August and still have enough to freeze for winter. Once you've been eating home-frozen corn for a few years, it's difficult to be satisfied with store-bought. But these days, I depend on the farmer down the road to grow my corn. The Conants sell sweet corn from mid-August through early September and it’s the most flavorful corn I’ve ever eaten – my own included.
Buying sweet corn at $5 or $6 a dozen is a good deal for dinner, but that would add up to $80 for a year’s supply of frozen corn – plus the six (or more) hours of labor to do the freezing. Instead, I get on a special list to be called when the Conants either over-pick or have too much corn ready at one time. At half price I don’t mind spending a long evening sweating over boiling water and turning my countertops and kitchen floor into a sticky mess. Ask around and maybe you can find a similar deal close to home.
If you haven’t frozen corn before, here’s a nice illustrated guide to the steps. It’s geared to freezing a large amount of corn at one time (500 ears!) but fun to see how it was done in most farm kitchens 50 years ago!
This second guide is geared to more modest quantities of corn.
I usually do two freezing sessions of 100 ears each. That’s about as much as I can take at one time. I should say as much as we can take. It’s a job I couldn’t do solo. The shucking, de-silking, cooking, chilling, cutting and bagging all have to happen within a few hours. Believe me. You’ll want help. And some good music.
Here are a few other tips for freezing corn:
Freeze corn the same day it was picked. If it’s older, you may as well just buy your frozen corn at the grocery store.
Sharpen your knife before starting in on the job. If you haven’t cut kernels from a cob before, you’ll get the hang of it by the end of the second dozen.
Stockpile LOTS of ice. The cobs need to be cooled in ice water for just as long as you cooked them. You’ll be glad to have stashed some big bags of ice when you run out of what’s in the ice maker after about 20 minutes.
Buy good-quality freezer bags. Thicker is better.
Flatten the bags after filling and stack them like pancakes. Label with the date.
Why is it that we gardeners can't be happy with the plants that thrive in our own zone? Don't we have enough challenges, what with diseases, pests and foul weather?
In my zone 4 garden, I have a stewartia, a shrub that's usually hardy to zone 6 or maybe 5. Though it's come through two winters just fine, this is the first year it's flowered abundantly.
We had houseguests from Texas last week, and I was proud to show off our garden on a remarkable, rain-free day. Like me, they are gardeners. And, like me, they long for what they cannot have. They swooned over the perennials, lilacs and peonies — the things that do so well up here, even with little help from the gardener. They did not even notice my agaves.
Why is it that we gardeners can't be happy with the plants that thrive in our own zone? Don't we have enough challenges, what with diseases, pests and foul weather? Maybe it's the possibility of triumph — even if it's just once.
I've been a zone-pusher for a long time. My list of disappointments is long, especially when I've tried to cross too many zones. Whether overwintering in the ground or in the basement, I've failed with Japanese fiber bananas, "hardy" gardenias, blue lacecap hydrangeas, agapanthus, lotus and more. But, once in awhile, I get lucky.
This year I got dozens of blooms on a stewartia, a shrub that has flowers that kind of look like camellias. I'd already tried planting it twice (both long dead), but this time, I chose a different selection of Stewartia pseudocamellia that I bought from a grower in my area. He had been growing it experimentally, not sure if it would pass the hardiness test. After two winters on the south side of my house, it bloomed this year. Triumph! What's more, the grower still has it on his plant list, so there could be a future for stewartia in Vermont's Champlain Valley.
I'm also delighted to see that my potted crapemyrtle is going to bloom this year. Too bad my Texas friends have already gone home. They would have been impressed. Well, maybe not.
Savvy gardeners enjoy some of the sweetest harvests of the year when the rest of us are already raiding our freezers or resorting to supermarket vegetables.
Plant peas in late July to early August for a delectable fall harvest.
Plant cold-tolerant fall vegetable crops in midsummer for late-season harvests.
For lots of folks, the Secret Garden isn’t a physical place; it’s a time of year. These savvy gardeners enjoy some of the sweetest harvests of the year when the rest of us are already raiding our freezers or resorting to supermarket vegetables.
If you think of sweet peas, lettuce, beet greens, and spinach as strictly spring crops, you’re not alone. Most of us rush to plant our spring vegetable gardens and then never plant another seed until the following year. As each vegetable matures and gets harvested, we pull it up and consider it “done” for the year.
That’s why I was so surprised when Kathy LaLiberte told me she would be planting peas this weekend. I double checked the calendar to make sure it was really late July and asked, “Isn’t it a little late and a bit too hot to be planting peas?”
She said, “A friend told me she plants peas after she harvests her garlic at the end of July. Peas are my very favorite crop, so I tried it last year and had a great fall harvest.” For this second crop, she plants a low-growing variety of edible pod peas that don't require a trellis, such as Sugar Ann.
I’ve been planting late broccoli for years because I discovered that there are far fewer pest problems in the fall. The broccoli that I pick in October rarely has cabbage worms and the cooler weather seems to improve the flavor, too. My early season broccoli transplants go into the garden a few weeks before the last frost date. Then I plant more broccoli from seed directly in the garden, about the time I set out frost-tender tomatoes and pepper.
Other vegetables that you can—and should!—replant during the summer include cucumbers, beets, radishes, lettuce and other greens, as well as celery and beans. Planting some new seeds every two to four weeks means you'll always have plants at the peak of their production and flavor. Multiple plantings is also insurance against a total crop failure, which can happen when you’ve “put all your eggs in one basket,” so to speak. (For more on this topic, read Double Your Harvest with a Second Planting)
Eliot Coleman author of The New Organic Grower’s Four-Season Harvest and other books has been a pioneer in succession planting. He and his wife, Barbara Damrosch, have more information on extending the garden harvest season in their books and articles and on their Four Season Farm web site. Eliot's newest book, The Winter Harvest Handbook, has detailed instructions, based on more than 30 years of market gardening, about staggering crops for maximum production.
I went out to Frog Island this morning. It was hot. My husband had mowed a path to it, bless him, so I wouldn't have to worry about startling snakes or them startling me in the tall grass.
Frog Island is not very big. Just 21 inches by 30 inches. It's one of the archipelago of Islandscapes that Gardener's Supply offers as accessories for ponds or water features. It's made out of recycled polyester and has depressions on top so you can cover your island with soil and plants. The plant roots wriggle their way down through the island until they reach the water in the pond. This lets them suck up whatever water they need so you never have to water. Islandscapes float so you can let yours roam free or tether it to a tree or stake for easier access.
I planted mine with pink cleome and red zinnias because it’s located far from the house and needs to have tall, colorful plants to catch my eye.
The unexpected delight is that a family of frogs has moved in, or I should say onto, the island. At any given time, there are at least five and as many as nine green frogs lounging about. The dark surface of the island makes it easy to see them. In the picture, you can see they’re looking out to all sides, arms and legs akimbo. If you sneak up quietly they stay put, but slap at a mosquito and they’ll give out a squeak before leaping into the drink like popcorn popping.
I hadn't been out to the island for a few weeks. When my son and his girlfriend visited from dry California, they discovered it and named it Frog Island.
Islandscapes don’t look like much to start, but they sure deliver handsome results!
-Debbie Page
Debbie is a Perennials Associate in our Williston, VT, store.
Like me, you’re probably hoping to eat a lot of tomatoes this month.
Like me, you’re probably planning to eat a lot of tomatoes in the next 60 days. Tomato sandwiches and tomato salads are my go-to favorites, but I’m always on the lookout for new ways to savor the tomato harvest.
Here’s an easy tomato tart recipe with two great variations, courtesy of our friend PJ Hamel, at King Arthur Flour down in Norwich, Vt.
The first version displays perfectly ripe, garden-fresh tomatoes (of almost any size and color) as the jewel-like beauties they are, adorned with nothing more than a little melted cheese. I’m planning to bring a few of these tarts to a pot luck dinner this week, with Sun Gold tomatoes as the star.
PJ’s second tart option has an herb-infused custard filling that gets topped with show-off slices of your beefiest beefsteak tomatoes. A hearty way to start the day. Yummy for lunch. Delicious for dinner.
If you’re new to King Arthur Flour’s “Baker’s Banter” blog, I encourage you to read down through a couple recent posts. The step-by-step pictures, clear instructions and friendly, over-the-counter encouragement are terrific.
The Garden Crusader Awards were created by Gardener's Supply to honor individuals who are improving the world through gardening. These enthusiastic men and women are planting trees and flowers, growing food, creating new green spaces, and teaching their friends and neighbors about the rewards of gardening.
To learn more about the people and programs that have received Garden Crusader Awards, see our Garden Crusader page.
Grow What You Eat
Do you grow what you eat? Check out our slideshow of gardeners who've taken the Grow What You Eat pledge. To see captions and full-size images, go to Flickr.
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