Garlic

It's garlic-planting time. Actually, it's getting on the late side to plant garlic already...but it's been awfully wet the past couple of weeks so we're a bit behind schedule. This year we're excited to trial a few types of heirloom garlic from Seeds of Diversity's Great Canadian Garlic Collection. Not sure yet which varieties we're going to get, but they're bound to be an interesting diversion from the standard 'Music' grown almost solely by most Canadian garlic producers.

You may have noticed that Ontario garlic is particularly expensive this year. The wet/drought combination were hard on the crop, and nematode damage was pervasive. (As point of reference, this fall organic seed garlic is priced at $9/lb!! Steep!) It's the nematode damage that's most concerning though - these little microscopic worm-like parasites overwinter on affected cloves & start back in with their eating come spring. We only experienced some mild nematode damage this year, but the problem can compound from year to year & become quite devasting.

There's a tricky heat treatment that's supposed to help, recommended by the Garlic Grower's Association of Ontario... but it involves treating the bulbs in a hot water bath at exactly 120F for 20 minutes - something I'm pretty skeptical of my ability to accomplish with a mere pot & stove element. The window between killing the nematode and killing the garlic cloves is awfully narrow!! Which is the worse risk...losing my 2012 crop to nematode damage, or losing it to death by cooking? Need to answer this internal debate soon or it'll be too late to plant.

In better news, other than nematode treatment, the garlic is cracked & ready to put in the ground, thanks to the help of our awesome members who tackled breaking apart most of 70lb of cloves at CSA pick-ups a couple of weeks ago!