Quote:
Originally Posted by meganp
Surely the new owners could have allowed you time for your crop to mature and return to harvest it? Did they put the ground to immediate use? How heartbreaking.
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It was not quite as bad as that. The crop
did mature & was harvested. At the time of harvest, I had not recently been in contact with the owners. They were long-time friends, but had not told us of their pending divorce, or of the sale of their land; so I had prepped the ground, and planned on re-planting. It was already October when I learned the land had been sold, too late for me to locate another plot of that size.
I squeezed as much as I could into one of my home plots, but many varieties could not be planted, and were consumed. Furthermore, because that plot was poorly drained & the garlic was planted late (in November) more than half of the varieties planted did not survive.
This is the second time I have lost all or most of my garlic collection. As a gardener, you learn to accept that there will be failures... but unlike seed crops, garlic stock is expensive to replace. I have re-acquired most of my favorite varieties (for the third time); but if I am unable to plant in time, or suffer severe losses prior to harvest, then I will be forced to give up on garlic.