November 2005

Winter is almost here and I'm already late for Summer.  I haven't planted garlic yet. This year  I want to plant it in the West Field but it's been so wet that I can't drive my tractor across the sidehills to prepare the soil there.  Last year I grew garlic in the North Field; and the year before that, in the Orchard.  Field to field, crops travel the farm, from year to year: this is rotation.

Crop rotation at its minimum means planting a variety where it was not grown the year before, or even the years before that.  In growing systems that do not rely upon synthetic pesticides, the rotation of crops is essential; it prevents the thriving of soil-borne diseases or pests which would be encouraged by planting the same vegetable  in the same place year after year. Furthermore, different plants draw different nutrients from the soil; a rotation of plantings with different plant families, one that looks forward several years, attempts to balance this nutrient draw from the soil over time; but in my case, with a manure based fertility system, where nutrients are replaced annually, or as needed throughout the growing season, this balancing of nutrient draw is of secondary importance.

When the sheep are at pasture, I dig into the barn bedding pack with the tractor using the front-end loader and fill the manure spreader with about 2 tons of aged manure mixed with hay refuse.  I tow the load to the field and spread it, then come back for another load.  The first load is easy, the second is more difficult as the spread manure makes the clay soil even slicker and the spreader slides at an angle behind the tractor across the side hill.  When the field is spread, I hitch the rototiller to the tractor and till the manure into the soil, two or three passes and I'm ready to plant garlic.

Before planting, the garlic heads must be broken apart into cloves; one planted clove will produce a head of garlic at harvest.  Each clove is pressed 2-3" into the soil, spaced about 8" from the other cloves in rows that are about 8-12" apart, 4 rows per bed, leaving a walkway between the beds for ease of harvest.  The planted garlic is then heavily mulched, or covered, with straw.  This will prevent the garlic clove from heaving out of the soil when it freezes, thaws and refreezes over Winter; and it will discourage weeds from growing and competing with the garlic for nutrients in the Spring.

Garlic has a long harvest period.  I pick garlic as 'chives' in May when the plant is 12" in height and as Spring garlic in June and July, when the greens can still be cooked, and it's 24"-36" tall; also at that time, I break off the scape, the edible flowering top of the plant; this redirects the plant's energy to the root to develop the cloves at the expense of the flower.  In early August, when the bottom leaves begin to brown, meaning the root is fully cloved, all the plants are harvested and dried for sale in the Fall and Winter; but I will save some garlic seed to be planted now, and hopefully earlier.

Eugene Wyatt