Growing PotatoesPotatoes are one of the most popular vegetables, so growing potatoes just makes sense! Potatoes are a warm-season crop, but they are somewhat frost-hardy. It is Mid-April as I write this and it got down to 28 Degrees F last night. The Potato plants got a little tip burned, but they'll snap back and be just fine. They are grown during the late winter in the south and west. Potatoes are susceptible to a number of diseases, so it is best to start growing your potatoes from certified disease-free seed potatoes.
They taste fresh and incredibly rich; not at all starchy. Just out of the ground, they are truly a remarkable vegetable. If I grew nothing else in my garden, I would grow my own potatoes. As with tomatoes, peppers and eggplants, every part of the potato plant besides the potatoes themselves are poisonous. So, don’t eat the leaves. Growing Potatoes
Planting potatoes correctly is crucial to growing large potatoes for eating. Start with disease-free seed potatoes. Seed potatoes should be stored in a cool dark place at 40 to 50 degrees F. Don’t use supermarket potatoes. Most are sprayed with a chemical that retards sprouting.There are dozens of varieties, in all kinds of shapes, colors and sizes. Choose the ones that appeal to your taste. I am fond of the fingerling varieties, which only grow an inch or two long. Of course, I am only 11 ½ inches tall , so they seem like good size bakers to me. Chitting Your Potatoes
To ensure that the potatoes sprout quickly, try “chitting” or pre-sprouting them before you plant. Here is how. About two or three weeks before planting, lay your potatoes out on a shallow tray and put them near a north-facing window, so that they get plenty of indirect light. Sprouts will begin to grow from the eyes. I like to plant whole potatoes if they aren’t too large. Large potatoes can be cut into pieces, no smaller than an egg, each piece having at least two eyes. Do this at the start of the chitting process, or in any case, at least 48 yours before you plant them. At that point, your potatoes are ready to plant. (Your garden gnomes will appreciate a heads-up before you start digging in our home turf. Thanks!) Planting TimeIn the north, you can plant potatoes in April. In the South and on the West coast, you can plant from February to March and harvest in June. In areas with mild winters, a second crop can be planted in August. They grow best in temperatures of 60-65 degrees. Do, start them early, or grow a late crop in the cooler parts of the season. They will survive all but a very hard frost, though they may get a little tip burn. Don’t worry; they will recover. To plant, dig a trench that is about six inches wide and six inches deep. Place the potatoes in the trenches, about four inches apart, and cover with about four inches of soil. After the stem shoots have grown up out of the soil, mound the soil around the stem, leaving about two inches of stem exposed. Three or four weeks later, mound the soil up to within two inches of the top again. This is called “hilling,” and it keeps the potatoes that form from turning green and also lets more potatoes form from roots that grow from the stems that have been buried during hilling. Growing RequirementsGrowing potatoes is easy, if you grow them according to their preferences. Potatoes will grow and grow well in a soil with a pH up to 6.5. But they often suffer from potato scab and other diseases if the soil pH exceeds 5.0 to 6.0, which is a bit on the acidic side. So maintain the pH at the lower level and don’t lime the soil before planting your spuds.Growing potatoes don’t require high amounts of food, but they do need an ample supply of phosphorus. If you mix compost into the soil just before planting and a little rock phosphate, the potatoes should have all of the nutrients they need to stay happy and healthy. You can side-dress with a seedmeal fertilizer about three weeks after planting. Apply the fertilizer at least six inches away from the plant. Digging and Harvesting
You can harvest potatoes as “new potatoes” by digging the potatoes during flowering, about two months after you plant the potatoes. For mature potatoes, use a fork (a garden fork) to dig out the potatoes when about half of the potato foliage has died back. Make sure that you don’t dig unless the soil is dry. If the potatoes don’t look large enough when you dig them, replace the soil and look again in another month. Gnomes love potatoes, so we definitely recommend that you start growing potatoes today. Happy gardening, Geefrank
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