It was Christmas evening and while wandering around my garden I found the sudden urge to pull up a garlic plant to see just how much they had grown. The longest day had past and there was some browning of the leaves starting so it wouldn't be such a bad thing would it? Curiosity got the better of me and I got down on my knees and started digging gently around in the soil. Just one would tell me all I needed to know...
They might look like they would be easy to just pull out but they aren't! You cannot pull the garlic out by its leaves (well, you shouldn't) you need to dig down and get right underneath it. Once out of the ground you can leave it lying for a few days or hang it some where dry, cool and airy. After chatting with some fellow gardeners I have concluded that there are many "right" ways of growing and curing your garlic, some say cut the roots off, some say leave them on to help the drying process. This is the first time I have grown garlic and I have to say I am really pleased with the results. The one above is the first Takanue I pulled, the little bulby things growing out the bottom are called corms, apparently if you plant them, in the second year you will get another garlic bulb...yay!
It didn't stop there though...by the next day I was itching to pull up the rest. And I did. I slowly pulled them up one by one and took them to the tap for a quick wash (you are supposed to leave them for a few days but I wanted some of the gunk off and there was a few spiders that had made their homes where the leaves and stem joined) gave them a dry off and pegged them to my washing line under the veranda. It wasn't until I stood back to admire my garlic curtain that I realised I only had ten bulbs...ten good sized, gorgeously fragrant bulbs but I had planted eleven and that one bulb counts! Thinking back it must have disappeared around the time that Sugar busted through the fence, ate the tips off and demolished my rhubarb *sigh*.
Though I was absolutely chuffed with my harvest of Takanue garlic, the threat of rain coming made me wonder if I should be pulling up the Kakanui bulbs. I had planted them in the totally wrong place from the start and hadn't been able to water the neighbouring corn as much as I would have liked for fear of water logging the garlic. It was as much excuse as I needed and just before midnight I scurried down to the garden and dug up my treasure. I'm not sure what anyone would have thought if they had seen me digging around in the garden at that time of night but anytime is a good time to garden in my book. The photo above is the whole harvest, I do have some more Kakanui in the garden but they are much smaller and I'm not sure if they will come to much. Even if they don't, I have enough from this year to save for next year and to share with a few others...a very good result!
