I noticed that our turmeric plant was starting to die out – no new leaves were appearing, and the existing ones were drying out. That reminded me of my ginger – when the leaves start to die off, the plant is supposedly ready for harvest. So, with trowel in hand, I started digging carefully…

Here’s what I unearthed:

Not a bad harvest - all the new bits grew from the dark, turd-like piece in the bottom left.

It was more impressive looking when I first dug it out, but unfortunately, turned out to be quite fragile and bits broke off easily when I was brushing the earth away to expose the full rhizome. The original rhizome (the crescent-like, dark bit) was at the bottom, with the newer growth above it. I was amazed at the vibrant orange (unfortunately, not captured well by the camera and so not shown) of the fresh turmeric. After a day of being aired out, the colours grew more dull. But, I will see them again when we next harvest turmeric. Obviously, I’m coveting the bits with roots attached to use as planting stock for the next round!

The plant took about 8 months to reach this stage.

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