Dawn Troutner Toledo Market Master

Market report for October 7, 2016

It was a nice evening for the Toledo Farmers’ Market on this first Friday of the last month of the market season.

Kristi’s table is getting shorter, but still full of kolaches, rolicky, rolls, bars, pies, cookies, breads, and tomatoes. Busy Bee Acres have plenty of honey in assorted sizes, solid lotion bars, lip balm, chunk honey, creamed honey, honey stixes, and cute little holiday bears full of honey for the Christmas stocking stuffer. Vernon and Wilma had eggs; this was the last week for the 18 pack pullet eggs.

Chuck and Ginger brought pies, angel food cake, cookies, breads, popcorn, fall baskets, gourds painted as ghostly gourds, onions, winter squash, leeks, cabbage, potatoes, hot and sweet peppers, pumpkins, garlic, apples eggs, and okra. Shirley and Michael had rolicky, kolaches, butchy, and kuchen. Dawn brought houseplants, sweet potatoes, onions, potatoes, tomatoes, fresh dill, cabbage, sweet and hot peppers, zucchini, green beans, cucumbers and winter squash. I also got a visit from the birthday boy. Happy Birthday to Austin.

Cheryl had plenty of fall ceramic pieces, scrubbies, towel sets, dishcloths, hot pot handle holders, adult bibs, bar soap sachets, and pouches for recycled bags. Lois, Marie, and Ethan had cucumbers, green peppers, butternut, acorn, pie pumpkins, and egg plant. Ethan brought his Cub Scout popcorn. Joe and Barb brought kohlrabi, lettuce, cabbage, leeks, onions, okra, hot peppers, small pies, jams, granola, wheat bread, cute little butternut squash along with delicate and spaghetti. Vicky was back with jams, breads, cookies, quilts, and her stuffed giraffe. Jim was there with his hand made leather items. And Red Earth Gardens had plenty of sweet and hot peppers, yellow beans, beets, micro greens, turnips and kohlrabi. There is three weeks of market left. See you there.

October, it’s hard to believe it is that time of year again. It’s time for pumpkins, gourds, squash, hay rides, corn mazes, and fun in the leaf piles.

It is also time to plant garlic. Garlic goes into the ground in October, grows through the winter and spring, and is ready in July. Garlic is one of those vegetables that aren’t easy to tell when it is ripe. Just watch the leaves.

Garlic bulbs are not like their cousins the onions. When onions have stopped growing their leaves begin to lose color and wilt. he tops will dry up and flip over pushing themselves out of the soil and are easy to see if they’ve fully matured. Garlic stays underground. Each leaf above ground indicates a layer of protective paper wrapped around the bulb. So if a garlic plant has twelve leaves, it has twelve protective paper layers.

There is no standard number of leaves a garlic plant should have. But, when half the leaves have died off, and half are still green it is telling you that the garlic has reached the harvest stage. Carefully dig around the bulb and lift it out of the ground. Now, lets talk about the time to plant garlic. Planting garlic in the fall, you will have bigger bulbs and more flavorful bulbs.

When planting the garlic, break apart the cloves from the bulb a few days before planting, but be careful and keep the papery husk on each individual clove. Plant in a well drained soil with plenty of organic matter and in a sunny spot. Place cloves four inches apart and two inches deep in their upright position, the root side down and the pointed end facing up. Mulch with straw and wait till spring. Garlic is one of the first things up in my garden. It’s always exciting to see those green shoots emerging through the ground. Happy planting and see you at market.