it was a good year

[rxkeith]

we had a good harvest of potatoes, more than i expected. one reason is that i didn't do
a thorough job of harvesting potatoes last year. i ended up with potato plants coming up
in many places in the garden. if they weren't too in the way i let them grow. as a result,
i have several pounds of fingerlings, some that got pretty long. also an assortment of reds, russets, and white potatoes. in one part of the garden that was left fallow for a couple years, some potatoes managed to survive for three years on their own, i got about 15 to 20 lbs out of that area.

i got some good varieties from a local source, who loves to save seed. she gave me ama rosa, a pretty potato that is red inside, and out, pinto, with a red and tan colored skin that seems to do very well here. i have a couple purple varieties from her. not sure of the names yet. one appears to be a fingerling type potato. i cooked that one this evening. it is really, really, purple inside, and out. starchy with good flavor, a real eye catcher. this one will be back next year.

i also had a modest harvest from my seed grown potato plants. i got maybe a couple lbs of small tubers, mostly purple, and also a few reds, and small white potatoes. i'll plant some of those next year.

thats it from here



keith

[matereater]

kind of surprised you can grow taters in the UP, didnt think the season would be long enough.


Glad to hear you had a good crop !

[rxkeith]

taters are one thing that does well here in da U.P.

i have read that they are trying to grow them in greenland. not too much garden wise can grow there with any degree of success.



keith

[svalli]

I am not surprised that potatoes grow well in the U.P., but I am surprised that those survived through winters. Here the spuds left in the soil usually rot following spring and do not sprout, but I keep getting volunteer plants from the true seeds.

Sari

[Worth1]

I stiil think potatoes might do well here as a fall crop and harvested the next summer.
It might be worth a try in a container.
What's the worse that could happen, the tops freeze back maybe.
The soil never freezes.

[bower]

I have a small patch of russets that have turned perennial here. They must have put some tubers way down into the subsoil, and keep coming back from those. It is also on the southwest (shaded) side of my garden which is last to lose its snow, so that may help to keep the soil from freezing. We don't really have cold winters here compared to continental places, but spring tends to be nasty with lots of frosts after snow cover is gone.

I've also seen at the farm that stray potatoes can still be a problem the following year, when you planted something else and up they come as a weed. I will have to comb through my potato bed carefully before I plant garlic there this fall.

[GoDawgs]

Yesterday I dug the five sweet potato hills and they totaled 14 lbs. Add to that the five pounds from the trellis hill and there are enough sweet potatoes to suit us. The two largest were 1 1/2 and 1 3/4 lbs. Most were "regular" size, whate3ver that is with sweet potatoes!





The sweets are now doing their two week cure in the garden shed. They are in baskets which are inside plastic trash bags with the shed temp around 88 degrees right now. The bags capture the moisture driven off the curing potatoes, providing the needed humidity factor but there are holes in the bags to let out any excess moisture and prevent rot. It’s a method I read about online and it worked fine last year.

[matereater]

Never heard of curing sweet potatoes, whats the purpose ?

[Worth1]

[QUOTE=matereater;746707]Never heard of curing sweet potatoes, whats the purposeUOTE]

You need to cure for at least two weeks to a month before eating so they will get sweet.
They have starch in them that turns to sugar.
Even a regular potato will get sweet in time.

If you buy and store your sweet potatoes now for the holidays they will be better depending on when they were harvested.