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Author: Karljürgen Feuerherm Page 5 of 8

Photograph of the garlic patch behind the house with arrow pointing north and labels for the garlic

Garlic fall 2020 (1)

By

On 23rd October 2020

In Gardening, Garlic

It was a nice day to day, and I was able to take a bit of time out from my teaching and marking schedule, so I made a start on the garlic planting. I had originally planned to do it during Reading Week (the week of Thanksgiving), but I had so much marking to catch up on that it just didn’t happen.

My harvest this year was pitiful, so I bought new starter bulbs from Golden Acres garlic farm. I spent a half or so going through the bags and breaking up some bulbs into cloves to come up with a preliminary plan. I have some bulbs left of each variety if I decide to plant more.

So today, I decided to start with the Leningrad variety and set aside 30 cloves. I planted it in two places (just like with stocks, it’s a good idea to diversify!):

  • behind the house, in a patch which I started this year for tomatoes and lettuce, I planted two rows from east to west of 9 cloves each spaced 6″ apart and with 16″ between the rows to allow for the mini-tiller to pass through, and
  • in the triangular area south of our driveway kindly on loan to me by our neighbours, I planted the remaining 12 cloves south of and parallel to the parsnips which I planted there earlier this year (which I am leaving to overwinter as it improves the flavour tremendously). The spacing between cloves was also 6″, and this was new ‘garlic territory’.

Depending on weather and time, I’ll continue with the remaining varieties, which should fit in the southern tip of the triangle, again in a spot I’ve never planted garlic before.

In the past, when I had more space at my disposal, I practiced crop rotation fairly diligently, but I haven’t the last few years, and it shows: the cloves have been infested. I don’t use any kinds of repellents, so this is to be expected to some extent; but I’m hoping to have some decent return next summer.

Arabic flashcards 4

By

On 4th October 2020

In Uncategorised

I’ve just added the vocabulary for Unit 4 to my flashcard spreadsheet and updated the Arabic page with it.

Tomayto, tomahto

By

On 30th August 2020

In Uncategorised

I bought a case of Roma tomatoes the other day, so I just had to try out a few recipes. I loved every one!

Check them out here:

And after I’d published those (as well as finally getting around to the pizza dough recipe), I started tidying up the menu. There’s a lot more work to do, but it’s a start!

Garlic planting, Fall 2019 (phase 2)

By

On 5th November 2019

In Personal

Finished planting the garlic for next year. It appears I may not have left enough space between clusters for the mini-tiller to pass, so I may have to perform surgery in the spring 🙁

In any case, again from west to east, in rows and columns of three, we have

  • Portugal #1, generation 2, 8 columns of 3, for 24 cloves
  • Portugal #2, generation 2, 8 columns of 3, for 24 cloves
  • Red Grain, generation 0, 12 columns of 3, for 36 cloves

Then a gap, and then the final set of clusters, west to east

  • Choparsky, generation 2, 9 columns of 3, for 27 cloves
  • Duganski, generation 2, 5 columns of 3, for 15 cloves
  • Irkutsk, generation 0, 4 columns of 3 plus 2 more cloves in the two northernmost holes, for 14 cloves, and
  • Ural Mountain, generation 2, 1 clove in the last hole with the Irkutsk.

All told, this makes another 141 cloves. With the 93 from the other day, that makes a grand total of 234 plants.

Garlic planting, Fall 2019 (phase 1)

By

On 3rd November 2019

In Personal

A little bit late, due to weather, etc.

Today I planted, in blocks of three (3) rows, from west to east

  • Leningrad, generation 2, eight (8) columns, for a total of 24
  • Leningrad, generation 0,[ref]Generation 0 indicates that these were purchased from the vendor (Golden Acres Garlic Farm). At each harvest, cloves retained for the next planting have their generation number incremented by one.[/ref] three (3) columns, for a total of 9[ref]These two Leningrad blocks are contiguous and not separated by marker.[/ref]
  • Persian Star, generation 2, eight (8) columns, for a total of 24[ref]Somehow, I ended up planting only 22, it seems. But I remember having been unsure of which column to put the cloves into at one point, so it is possible/likely that I doubled up one of the previous columns on two (2) occasions, in which case, it will be a matter of moving the doubled cloves to the last column once they come up in the spring.[/ref]
  • Siberian Hot, generation 2, four (4) columns, for a total of 12, and
  • Khabar,[ref]The vendor has told me that this is a variant on Persian Star, but with larger cloves.[/ref] generation 2, eight (8) columns, for a total of 24.

This makes 93 cloves planted today, all told.

Lebanese falafels

By

On 2nd September 2019

In Recipe

Adapted from here: https://www.mamaslebanesekitchen.com/mezza/falafel-from-scratch/ with thanks to the original author!

National Post: John Ivison: Think populism’s on the way out in Canada? Its foremost exponent is just warming up

By

On 18th July 2019

In Politics

This is a concern worth considering: getting people to vote out of their emotions is the right tactic to win, but gets us the wrong winners.
Fortunately, education can address this. If only we still had real education….
John Ivison: Think populism’s on the way out in Canada? Its foremost exponent is just warming up
Canadian Conservatives had best hope the wave has broken, because there are few more capable exponents of populist techniques than Justin Trudeau

Read in National Post: https://apple.news/AIGcEsh57Rsi_bIGgOp4Kew

Shared from Apple News

National Post: Andrew Coyne: Reforming Canadian democracy starts by reforming candidate nomination process

By

On 18th July 2019

In Politics

And the reason this isn’t happening is that a much more basic reform is needed: the reform of human beings themselves! It’s the fly in the ointment in every political system….
‘
Andrew Coyne: Reforming Canadian democracy starts by reforming candidate nomination process
Of the more than 6,600 major party candidates in the last five federal elections, just 17% were chosen to represent their parties in competitive nomination races

Read in National Post: https://apple.news/AztBZxcX7R8GaAYzwdM2ggA

Shared from Apple News

Garden plantings on 27 May 2019

By

On 27th May 2019

In Personal

As the downpours have temporarily halted and the ground has dried sufficiently to be somewhat (!) workable, I did a bit of planting today.

White Spanish onions

First, I planted some White Spanish onions in front of the house in the spaces between the six grape tomato plants I planted the other day (and forgot to log here).

This involved a little bit of preparation to get rid of the weeds which have started to grow, followed by the distribution of a handful of onion sets which I bought the other day. There was no particular count; it was a spur-of-the-moment purchase as it’s a wet year—I’ve had no luck with onions in the past….

Yukon Gem potatoes

I had also bought 6 Yukon Gem seed potatoes and planted them in the southern part of the garlic patch.

To make sure I know where they are later, I made 18″ stakes out of rips from 2 by 6s or the like which I had lying around. In the past, I’ve always used bamboo canes, but they are very fragile and tend to break and get lost.

I’ll add a diagram in due course; I have more potatoes to plant, but this involves mounting the loader on the tractor (so that I can add some soil to the southern portion of the garlic patch, where it’s low), and I’ve no time left for that today.

Garlic update: 25 May 2019

By

On 27th May 2019

In Personal

Two days ago, I did a survey of the garlic patch. I was quite pleased with the results: most of the garlic I had planted last fall came up, and is growing well thanks to the rain. The main concern will be the potential for rot if the downpours continue.

Here’s a photo of my hand-written survey. North is at the bottom of the page.


Legend:

  • (mostly) open circle: successfully growing plant
  • stand-alone filled circle: bamboo separator
  • ‘2’ means that two plants are growing rather than one
  • ‘x’ means that nothing is growing there (either nothing was planted or else the clove has rotted etc.)

Garlic types are annotated,[ref]As one can see from the diagram, I have resolved the ‘Irkutsk’ confusion I alluded to in the fall; given the number of columns all told, it would appear I did in fact only plant 3 cloves of Irkutsk.[/ref] as are the occasional ‘volunteer’ plants.

The dotted circles represent patches in which I planted garlic seeds; the sprouts can be used as a kind of garlic chive.

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