The Potatoes are growing!

The potato tower is finally starting to send out sprouts.  I was beginning to think that part of our potato experiments wasn't going to be very successful. It certainly has taken a lot longer than the potato bag.  Even the potatoes planted at the very top of the tower have only just come up. So far, I'd have to declare the potato bag as the winner for ease of use and amount of plant growth. Of course, the final winner won't be declared until we've seen the amount of potatoes actually produced.

Sweet Potatoes

A couple of us had more thoughts on potatoes and someone wanted to know the difference of potatoes and sweet potatoes so I found this article in another blog about Sweet potatoes. You may not know this, but sweet potatoes and potato potatoes are nothing alike. Sure, they are both tasty treats that grow underground. But, that’s where the similarities end. Sweet potatoes are related to morning glories, which explains their cheerful purple flowers and their rambling vines. But, those trusty Irish spuds? They belong to the tomato family, and are cousins to peppers, tomatillos and eggplants — the nightshades. Sweet potatoes like the heat. They need the heat. Potato potatoes? Well, they thrived in Ireland (until they didn’t). Heat is not something they really appreciate. Cool and moist suits them just fine. This is why we plant our spuds in the early spring, and wait until the real heat sets in to introduce the sweets to the garden. To make new sweet potatoes, we start with an old sweet potato. An organic sweet potato (the non-organic sweet potatoes may be treated with sprout-suppressing chemicals). Ideally, you’ll start with a locally-grown organic sweet potato, because then you’ll know that variety will thrive in your region. But, don’t sweat this step too much. A sweet potato from the grocery store should also work just fine. Just, really, buy an organic one. Ok. So, you’ve got your organic sweet potato. Great. Now, we’re going to cut it up. Just slice it in half, across the middle. Next, place each section of sweet potato into a container with water. Plenty of people use toothpicks to suspend their sweet potato halves in a glass of water, but I think it’s easier to just set the whole thing into a casserole dish. Use enough water so that about an inch or two of the potato is submerged. Set the container near a window, and you’re done. Over the next few weeks, the sweet potatoes will send out little baby plants. Your only responsibility during this time is to keep that water level fairly constant. The sweet potatoes will take care of everything else. After four to six weeks, you should have a nice growth of little baby sweet potato plants. These will become your slips. With any luck, some of your sweet potato sprouts will already have roots. Excellent. These little plants-to-be are ready for planting. Others won’t have any roots at all. No worries, those laggards will catch up real fast. Remove the sprouts by snapping them off at the point where they emerge from the sweet potato tuber. Congratulations! You have your first sweet potato slip! Once you’ve got all your sweet potato slips in their pots, all you need to do is keep them happily watered until it’s warm enough for them to move outdoors. I like to keep mine in a big styrofoam box. Easy to water. Easy to transport outside for some sunlight during the day. And, easy to bring inside again before the evening chill. No styros? Well, anything that holds water should do fine. A casserole dish. A plastic storage tub. A big pot. It’s just easier if it holds water and holds a bunch of seedlings, because you could be doing a daily shuffle from inside to outside to inside again for a while now. Whatever you keep them in, it’s best to coddle your sweet potato seedlings until two or three weeks after your last frost date. Then, once the nights are reliably above 50°F, you can plant them out into the garden. Most people grow their sweets in the ground. I prefer containers, because it makes the harvest easier. Last year, I tried bushel baskets with great success. This year, I’m building a big potato planter. And, yes, I’ll be doing bushel baskets too. A gardener can never have too many sweet potatoes.

Potato Totes & Bags

The Potato Planting Demonstration on Saturday Feb 23rd was a great success.  Everyone got to participate in cutting the potatoes and planting them.

 Mike had a very intent audience as he showed examples of good potatoes and bad potatoes.

What are they looking so hard at?  Maybe the potatoes were escaping - that might explain all the laughter in this picture.

Two methods (bag & tote) were extremely easy and fast to do. The bag came from Gardener Supply as a Potato Bag Kit  which contains a potato bag, 3 bags of soil mix and fertilizer. (You have to buy your own potatoes.)                       

The basics were the same for using the potato bag and the tote. Put a 2-3 inch layer of organic material in the bottom, put in the seed potatoes, cover with another 2 inches or so of organic matter, fertilize and water in well.

Wait until the potatoes begin growing and when the sprouts are 4 inches or so tall, put dirt around the stems (but leave some green leaves sticking out), water and wait some more.

Repeat this procedure until the top of the container is reached. Potatoes will form all along the stem that is buried in dirt. If you want to read more about  Growing potatoes in containers, this is a good link.

The tote is a super size plastic bin (18 gallons or more). Because it is solid plastic, you need to punch lots of holes in the bottom and along the outside edge to provide drainage.  Once the holes are punched, fill with soil and potatoes.














It will be interesting to see which produces the most potatoes - the tote or the bag.

We also constructed a potato tower but that will have to be in a separate post!

Potato Planting Demonstration

When: Saturday February 23

Time:  2:00 pm

Place: The Garden

What: Mike will be demonstrating 4 different methods of planting and growing potatoes.  We'll be able to watch how they grow all season and then feast on them when they are ready to eat. It will be interesting to see which method yields the most.

   If the weather looks iffy, check the blog as a note will be posted Saturday by 1:00 pm

 

  The rain date will be Sunday February 24 at 1:30 pm

How to Chit Potatoes

 

You can see the exposed cut skin drying out in

one hour. Put the chitted potatoes in a cool dark

at this point! A garage works like a root cellar this

time of year

What is chitting you say?


Chitting simply means getting the potatoes off to a good start by getting the sprouts to start growing before planting them. Home potato growers chit to increase the yield and quality of their potatoes.

 

Seed potato tubers need “chitting” before planting but if you don’t have time to do this, don’t worry. The potatoes will still grow but they will take several more weeks to mature. 



Start the chitting process about 6 weeks before you intend to plant. To do this you need to place them in seed trays, egg boxes or something similar in a cool well lighted place. Make sure you put the seed potato rose end up (the blunt end with the most shoots or ‘eyes’). After a while they will start shooting out new growing shoots. Once these are 1”- 4” long they can be planted out. This process is more important when planting early varieties of potato.

Planting times vary depending on when the last frosts are expected and potatoes need to be planted no earlier than about 6 weeks before this. Potato varieties are classed into three types: 1^stEarly, 2^nd Early and Main Crop. (These terms refer to the time from sowing to harvesting only.)

• Start the 1st Earlies in Mid to late February. 1^st Early are ready in around 10 weeks
• Start 2nd Earlies in March/April. 2^nd Early are ready in about 13 weeks
• Main Crop potatoes are planted a couple of weeks later. Main Crop potatoes are ready after 20 weeks or so. 

 Here are two ways you can grow your chitted potatoes once they are ready to be planted out.

1. Use a plastic container (with a lid). The lid is important because if the weather gets cold, you can just put the lid over the green potato leaves to keep them from being burned.
2. Or use a store bought potato growing bag. 

To turn this plastic container into a potato growing tote,
make holes two inches from the bottom for drainage.



Store bought potato growing bag

 

 

 

 

 

 

      Pictures and information provided by Mike

 

What to look for in Seed Potatoes & How to store Them



Healthy seed potato

Q:  Which potato should you choose to start your potato crop with - special seed potatoes or grocery store potatoes.

A:  Potatoes are best grown using specially grown seed potatoes. The most important reason to use seed potatoes is that they have not had an inhibitor applied to them.

That isn't to say you can't use potatoes from the grocery store. However, they usually have had an inhibitor applied to stop them sending out their “chits” (growing shoots).


Grocery store potato - notice the
 purple/black eyes.These are not healthy.

Because of the inhibitor applied, grocery store potatoes frequently have unhealthy looking eyes. As well, the inhibitor causes growth to be stunted and production is reduced by 50 to 100%.

Use 4 inch pots with crumpled paper
 in the bottom to store seed potatoes



Use an egg carton to store seed potatoes

Once you have purchased your seed potatoes, you need to store them so they don't get moldy.

Putting them in a bag in the dark is not the way to go. You want air around each potato so they don't touch and become moldy.

Put each potato in its own "room" so there is air around each potato and the eyes don't get squashed.

Be sure and put them rose end up (blunt end with the most eyes).

Two easy (and cheap) ways of storing the seed potatoes - use an egg carton or 4" pots that plants came in.


  Pictures and information provided by Mike



 

Looking for Seed Potatoes?

Some of you may be looking for seed potatoes since it is almost time to get your potatoes planted out. Denise talked to Leslie at Pike's Tuesday and they are about to order their potato sets. But if you want them right this very minute - go to Elrod's!

Mike sent me an email (with a picture) telling me that Elrod's

already has their potato sets in the store.

Buy them while they have them!