Dang. First set-back.

The only problem with being a beginner veggie gardener (the only thing I've grown in the past were cherry tomatoes and basil) - - is figuring out WHEN to plant and HOW MUCH to plant. There are tons of resources out there - websites, books, the almanac, etc. But they all seem to be giving me different information. I wish someone made a ZONE 6 PLANTING CHART that was consistant with all the other information out there - but they don't. I tried to make my own but now I'm finding out that, once again, I had false information.

Yesterday, when I googled "growing garlic" - a website told me to plant cloves in early spring. Today I looked again, found a gal in St. Louis MO, who had this to say in her blog:

SO HERE'S THE RIGHT WAY, IN SHORT, TO GROW GARLIC IN YOUR OWN GARDEN. To grow your own garlic, plant cloves in the fall, not the spring. They'll pop out of the ground in late spring. When the tall scapes appear later in the spring, snip them off right away.. A month or more later, pull a test garlic out of the dirt to see if it's ready for harvest. If it is, carefully dig up the heads. Wipe clean the heads with a paper towel (a very thin papery layer will come off), cut off the roots, store in a dry dark spot. Cook/eat as normal but use less until you understand its potency. From A Veggie Venture. And here's a picture of her first garlic harvest:



*sigh* So no garlic this summer.

On the bright side, my mom suggested using pinwheels around the garden to help keep the squirrels away. I'll try anything. We have TONS of squirrels and they love, love, love to dig.