Date: January 27th 2012

It's just past the coldest part of winter here in inland Central California, the weather has been much drier than normal, and the seed crop was late to be planted, early December. The field is in excellent condition, after fallowed for 15 months after a crop of sweet corn, it is weed free, and the plants look healthy, 2-6" tall already. Double line buried drip irrigation and overhead sprinklers plus drip fertigation as well as slightly above normal temperatures, and very dry conditions are all pointing to high quality, after the seed stock spent an extended vernalization time in the cooler since September. We are looking for a vigorous crop including several varieties of garlic which we have been rebuilding for the past few seasons. Grey shallots were in short supply for several seasons as we would constantly oversell into our seed stock, but 2011 season we put on the sales brakes, and now look to have an abundant crop. The early color is excellent, and we hope through k
eeping steady with mositure and fertigation, to realize some sizing advantages over other seasons, which we hope for translation into high and healthy yields.

The price and availability sheet will be updated as we move closer to the 2012 late summer sales season. Unless you specifically request garlic or shallots for consumption, we are geared to process orders in September and October, and usually sell out by November. Consumption, or early request orders can be processed in July, but we typically take most of August off / away from garlic and shallots, getting a little vacation, getting the kids ready for school, and focusing on other farming activities.

We still operate somewhat old fashioned, relying on our customers to send checks, (no paypal or cards), and we do prefer simple email messages with address and phone numbers attached, to better able us to understand your geographical / weather challenges. We have not pursued shipping outside of the United States, and plan to keep doing business domestically. We appreciate your patience, and your comments. Any who were shorted last year, we hope to be able to better help with those things you request this season.

Adding to our vegetatively produced shallots and garlics, true seed shalklots, (not vegetatively produced shallots) is looking to become part of our lineup. Any comments of your experiences are welcomed.

Sincerely,

Greg Tesch
www.shallotseed.com
www.garlicseed.com