Epic Garlic Harvest Happened Again!

Every late spring we harvest our elephant garlic with the help of folks from the community. In the past we waited until June, but this year decided May was the time to get the job done. It was the right decision! As with all storage alliums (onions & garlic) dry weather leading up to harvest is ideal. This helps jump start the curing process because there is less water in the outer leaves to start with. This year we had a week of rain leading up to the harvest! What can you do? We managed to get it all out of the ground, cleaned and set out in our barn to dry (cure) in a couple of days. We got it out of the ground before many of them could split because of the late rain. Whew....just in time.

Sunday was the big haul. Over 20 volunteers arrived to help us with this giant task! THANK YOU!!!! Together we dug all 6,300 garlic plants, loaded them onto two trailers and spent the rest of the day cleaning off the outer layers and hanging them to dry. It did not get entirely finished Sunday, so our crew with the help of two more volunteers finished the last of it on Tuesday. We were exhausted! It was all worth it because now this wonderful crop will be available for sale for the coming months. Storage crops are the coolest.