Planting Garlic

    Fall is a great time to plant garlic! Garlic does well in our northern Utah gardens with a few a the following tips.

     Hardneck vs. Softneck Garlic The neck refers to the stalk that grows upward from the garlic bulb.

  Hardneck Garlic: The stalk stems from the center of the bulb and turns rigid at maturity. This garlic has more complex flavors than softneck and sometimes will pick up more subtle flavors that denote where they are grown.

  Softneck Garlic: These stalks are made up of leaves rather than a central stalk. These leaves stay flexible and soft once mature. This garlic has a more extended shelf life than hardneck and has a mild, mellow flavor. This type of garlic is commonly found in grocery stores. 

     Planting garlic is very similar to planting tulips. Try to plant it by or around October 20th. Add one teaspoon bone meal on top of each bulb at fall planting. It may or may not start growing before it gets cold, but that's not a problem. 

     When snow melts and the leaves start growing in the spring, generally early March, top dress the plants with just a sprinkle of fertilizer (16-16-8) muck like feeding chickens. Let the garlic reach 8-10 inches high sometime in April then hit it with some liquid fertilizer like Fertilome All-Purpose (20-20-20). Top dress again in May with 16-16-8 and then in June when it gets hot give it one more shot of liquid fertilizer.

     By the first week of July these plants shut down no matter what you do. Wait until about 4-6 of the leaves have wilted and then pull the garlic. Brush off all the dirt and string them together in a braid of sorts and hang them in the rafters of your garage or shed to dry. You want a warm, dry place out of the sun. For approximately 3-4 weeks let the garlic dry. Take them down and twist off the beard or the roots. Cut them off at about two inches and put 6 or 8 heads in a nylon bag. Save some of the cloves for planting next fall and then pick out what you want to use or give away.

     If you keep a whole head of garlic unpeeled in a dry, dark place at room temperature, it will last close to six months. A single unpeeled clove will last about three weeks. Refrigeration can help extend the shelf life but can cause sprouts to develop quickly. Freezing is not recommended.

     It's best to purchase garlic bulbs from local garden nurseries or through the mail. Garlic bulbs in the store are not very fresh and can be treated for shipping or storage at the retail location and generally won't produce satisfactory harvests.

EARLY SPRING

Follow us on Instagram, Facebook and Pinterest! Just look for Call's Country Nursery! And visit our website at callscountrynursery.com

SPRING UPDATES!! 2016

Welcome Spring 2016!

We are in the process of filling up the greenhouses with bedding plants and hanging baskets. It won't be long and tomatoes will be transplanted, followed by petunias, sweet potato vine and zinnias, and much more. It does seem to be an early spring and folks are itching to do some yard work.
Typical gardening chores at this time of year consist mainly of fertilizing the lawn, spring cleaning out the flower beds of fall debris, and pruning fruit trees and applying dormant spray.
On any warmish spring day, cleanup is easy to execute. As for lawn fertilizing, it's a good idea to wait another week or two before applying a weed and feed product.
Before it gets much warmer, pruning and dormant spray application should be taken care of before leaf buds develop further. Dormant spray helps kill off any bugs that are hiding dormant on fruit trees, etc that can cause damage to developing fruit. Once the bugs emerge from dormancy, it's too late for this important step. Now is a perfect time to accomplish those tasks.
Of course be on the lookout for early spring bulbs peeking out of the soil including crocus, snow drops and maybe a few daffodils!

Last weekend we participated in the first annual Bear River Valley Showcase home and garden show held at the Box Elder County fairgrounds. What a great time we had meeting new faces, visiting with regular customers and answering all kinds of questions about yards and gardens. We even gave away a lot of potted herbs to show guests to enjoy some fresh green in their kitchen and home cooked meals. We are so thankful to all the show guests and of course our many wonderful customers who voted our booth as People's Choice at the show case! What a pleasant surprise!




Our shipments of trees and shrubs will start arriving mid to late April. Even though it is warm and it seems natural to start planting, be patient. We still have frost in our climate zone well into May. Some of our product is shipped in from the warm west coast and sometimes arrive fully leafed out or in bloom. Chances are still high for frost damage in our higher elevation and we try our best to prevent this and have good strong and healthy plants for success in your yard.

Pansies, dianthus, snapdragons, and flowering cabbage are tough enough to plant outside now. They handle the frost and spring snows like warriors!

Our entire spring class schedule is posted on our Facebook page and our store website. Bill Varga will teach this week's class on pruning and all the basic fundamentals for trees and shrubs. Class starts at 10:00 am March 12th. No need to sign up, just come and enjoy. Another pruning class will follow on March 19th at 10:00 am taught by our local extension agent Mike Pace. Mike will have an emphasis on fruits and berries. Both classes will last about an hour with a question and answer period following. Bring your questions to ask the experts! Both of our pruning classes are very popular and draw a nice crowd.

USU Invasive Insect workshop

For Box Elder County Fruit Growers and Gardeners,

Announcing a workshop that USU Extension & USU IPM team will be putting together this Friday (Mar 6) in Brigham City. They will cover the monitoring, management, and identification of Spotted Wing Drosophila and Brown Marmorated Stink Bug. SWD is a very destructive pest of fruit and BMSB is a destructive pest of fruits and vegetables. SWD has been found in Box Elder County, as well as Rich, Cache, Weber, Davis, and Utah Counties. BMSB has been found in Salt Lake and Utah Counties.

To register or for more information about these workshops see http://utahpests.usu.edu/caps/htm/events-and-workshops

Spotted Wing Drosophila

Brown Marmorated Stink Bug

Utah State University Extension gardening classes 4-week series

The USU Extension office will be holding a 4 week series of gardening classes for Box Elder County residents. The first class starts on Thursday, March 5 and will be taught at the USU Brigham City Campus. The classes will focus on small fruit, tree fruit and vegetable production. To register for the class, go to http://extension.usu.edu/boxelder/ and click on the gardening class link.

February Gardening

Our current Utah winter conditions have been more like a perpetual balmy spring, and terribly dry. Punxatawny Phil in Philadelphia may have seen his shadow on Groundhog Day, but the groundhogs around here demanded an early spring and it seems as though that's what we are getting! Sunshine abounds!
With that said, pay attention to trees and shrubs in your yard, especially those most recently planted. Even though it is winter and in their dormancy you don't notice any growth above ground, below ground they are still somewhat active. They still need a drink to prevent winter kill and damage, and to get established. Drag out the hose and after it spits out the ice cubes, let the water trickle around the roots under the dripline and give them a good soak. They'll love you for it! This is a good idea all through winter, not just during warm and dry February!

Check out this link for more in depth information: Preventing Winter Injury