for any lingering vampires

See, lots of details don’t make it onto the blog contemporaneously with their occurrence.  I put the garlic to bed on October 20th, I think (not one hundred percent sure now), which was five days later than recommended. Oops!

The package of seed garlic arrived around September 10th.  I’d preordered a beginner’s sampler in the fall, a small amount of garlic for a small kitchen garden, but two different varieties.  One variety is supposed to be easy, nearly can’t fail, good for beginners — which is good because not only have I never grown it, but I don’t know anyone who’s ever grown it in the South whom I may ask for advice.  That’s the one pictured above, by the way.

The other variety is supposed to be more “challenging.”  In other words, easy to screw up.

The booklet that came with them explained all about growing garlic and onions and gave the ideal planting dates for this area as between Septembr 15th and October 15th.  Well, as you know, I was on a terrible deadline the last of September and first bit of October.  Once that concluded, we had blue skies and I had plenty of time, but I decided I’d do it the next week once I’d recovered a bit more energy from my big work push.  I lazed around all week, seeing the garlic staring reproachfully at me from the shelf.  But I managed to ignore it.

Then came the deluge, rains that never seemed to let up for four hours together.  The area I’d cleared and pre-fertilized for the bulbs was saturated and cold.  But finally, there was a break in the downpour long enough to plant something.  The results, of course, won’t follow until late next spring, in April or May.

I probably ought to have posted the garlic pics in time for Hallowe’en, to ward off any vampires visiting the blog.

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