I was late getting out of the house to the state park trail on Sunday. The challenge was how to photograph the expansive patch of invasive lilies, and I had no good answer. I was distracted by the need to return home as quickly as possible to harvest the garlic crop I planted last fall.

When I arrived in the garden about 45 minutes later, the atmosphere was clouded with brown smoke that arrived overnight on upper-level winds after drifting hundreds of miles south from Canadian wildfires. I could feel it in my lungs, yet with ambient temperatures in the low seventies, the time for harvest was now.

Last fall, I planted 150 cloves of garlic in six rows. They each produced a head. The leaves were dying off and they were ready for harvest.

After weeding in spring, I let the grasses grow around them. Now I pushed the grass aside and went in with a long-bladed spade. It took a single stroke to loosen the garlic plant, then I pulled it and tossed it to the side.

After a couple of rows I began stacking them in the garden cart that came from my father-in-law’s estate. I have done this so many times, the process is routine.

I took a break to harvest okra, green beans, cucumbers, zucchini, and yellow squash. We don’t talk about zucchini and cucumbers this time of year because there is such abundance. The food pantries will be getting some.

I hauled the cart of garlic to the garage where I cleared a space under the table that also serves as a garlic rack. I put away the table top and laid two 2x4s on the driveway, lining up the plants all going the same direction. Once they were in place, I put another 2×4 on top of them and tied them together with twine. Finally, I moved them inside and placed each end on a sawhorse I made specially for the garlic rack. It is tall enough they can hang underneath without touching the ground.

I moved the two sets of garlic as far apart as was reasonable could so they could get air around them on both sides. If they aren’t drying properly in a couple of days, I will place a floor fan blowing air across them for a few days to a week.

This harvest took six hours.

The garlic harvest is always a big day because so much of our cooking depends upon using it. There is nothing like using garlic grown in the back yard.