Potatoes

[Forky]

We also grow enough spuds for the whole year and enough to share with the kids.
My buddy played a prank on his neighbor's kid last year. The kid was always around trying to help and asked alot of questions, but was a decent kid..... so he told him he was gonna dig potatoes the next day and he could come and help in the afternoon..... my buddy covered a bag of potato chips next to a plant and when they dug that one that one first he said.....you shoulda seen the look on that kids face!

 

[mwemaxxowner]

Great advice, thanks y'all!

My sand drains very well. It's also almost always very dry here in the summer. I've never seen water standing here but I'll keep that in mind! Right now I'm using soaker hoses, once things are more well established I'll run drip line and put emitters only where I need them. It's about time to do that, actually. I was waiting for the stuff in the ground to pop out.

My potatoes actually came from a bag of "mixed" varieties. So, unfortunately, I won't really know what kind the best ones were. I might change that approach next year.

Keeping in mind that I like to mix in a little top soil and compost before I plant, do I still need to be concerned with potato blight?

If so, if I just flip flop my rows yearly will that be sufficient? For example I have one row of all tomatoes, and one row that.has my cabbage, squash, brussels, and maybe my broccoli, can't remember. If I trade the potatoes with one of those rows will that do? I only have about ¼ row that is potatoes. I could easily shift that somewhere. I really think I like the idea of doing it next year in a hay bale!

 

[RalphVa]

In all my volunteer time on the hort helpdesk as a master gardener, never once ran into a case of potato blight.

Potatoes aren't subject to much bad stuff. Maybe if you over water. I never really water mine.

If you're concerned about it, dig a hole and put a potato piece in and fill with mulch. The mulch will be loose enough to dig for "new" potatoes early and will not retain moisture as much. Can just grow in mulch in a basket, too.

 

[mwemaxxowner]

With the loose sand they're planted in I'm not really concerned with that. I don't want to ruin the ground for future crops though, if that part is a concern.

 

[5030]

We keep ours in mesh sacks in the root cellar along with onions and carrots layered in sand plus all the canned goods too. Nice to own an old farm house with a root cellar plus 2 freezers for meat (wild and domestic) as well as shelled corn and stuffed peppers from the garden too.

 

[mwemaxxowner]

I guess I could toss them in the crawl space .

I read that I would need to cure them, then store at 40-50 degrees and 95% humidity if I wanted 6-8 months of storage. I read that if I can't duplicate that I am good for more like 2-3 months.

I think I can probably cure them, and then muster 40-50 degree temps, but I have no way to maintain a set humidity level. Humidity levels stay somewhat high in the house at around 60 percent, even in the winter (yay South Carolina!), So I could keep them somewhat humid but not 95%.

 

[grsthegreat]

my wife just stores them in 5 gallon buckets covered in wood shavings. No lid. unwashed. they last all winter and long into spring. leaves them in garage.

 

[mrblanche]

For us it's about teaching our daughter a little bit about where her food comes from, and how to grow it. I've also always just wanted a garden, makes this ground feel more like mine I guess.

I'm not expecting it to work out in our favor money wise, but so far we're enjoying it. We like good fresh fruits and vegetables, herbs etc, and I think it'll be quite rewarding to step out into the back yard and pick something for dinner. We've been growing some herbs that we use for some time now.

I also know what is, and ISN'T in this food!

Gardening, like hunting, is a way to raise your basic food cost into the lobster and caviar range. But dirty hands ARE fun!

 

[denchen]

Potatoes will store for quite a long time is stored without being washed. They must be in good condition and not been knocked about too much. They can be stored in paper sack or hessian sacks or in an open shed. They must NEVER be allowed to catch a frost and should be kept covered, not too warm and in the dark. The old fashion method used by farmers was to put them in a long heap in the field, this heap was covered in straw about 18 inches thick and the straw was covered with soil with a small opening along the top. The potatoes were kept like this until the price increased in the winter months, When needed the end was removed, the potatoes riddled to remove and soil, put into sacks and sold. We called these `potato graves` but others called them `clamps`. For family use we used to keep the potatoes in 56lb paper sacks, and the old trick was to sprinkle a few grains of Tecnazene crystals in each bag, this stopped them sprouting, but I understand this practice is frowned upon by some. Keep the frost off, keep the light out, keep them dry and they should be all right.

 

[mwemaxxowner]

I joked, but I think I really could store them in the crawl space. It'll be cool and damp, but above freezing and frost would stay off of them. It would already be fairly dark so being in a sack or container and covered would seal the deal I think.

 

[jdmeth]

Retired commercial Florida potato grower. Your soil looks like the northeast Florida soil I have. Potatoes like lots of fertilizer, 300 lb acre N, 100 lb acre P, 300 lb acre K. Do the math for your size garden (one acre=43560 sq ft). Put down two thirds of fertilizer at or soon after planting then split the other one third. Half when they are 8-12 inches then hill and the other half just before they fall over and hill again. Do spray for blight, every week starting when they are 12 in high. You can look for cracked soil and feel around for growing spuds to pull a few early. Keep the bottom of the ally moist but do not let them flood.

It is full blown harvest time here in Hastings, Fl. We plant in January-Feb. Good luck.

 

[RalphVa]

Never fertilized potatoes in regular soil either here in Va or in NJ or in La.

 

[jdmeth]

Never fertilized potatoes in regular soil either here in Va or in NJ or in La.

Sandy soils have little organic matter and nitigen and potash just leach out with any rainfall. The soil just holds the plant up.

 

[RalphVa]

Sandy soils have little organic matter and nitigen and potash just leach out with any rainfall. The soil just holds the plant up.

I'd be inclined to put a potato piece in a hole and fille with mulch. That should work even in sandy soil, and not require any fert. Any chemical fert kills all life in the soil, just supplying the plant with its NPK, but you'll have to keep using it because the soil will be dead. Better to use some compost rather than fert.

 

[mwemaxxowner]

That is why I am blending in a layer of compost, and want to also mix in a little top soil and compost each year going forward. I will probably also mulch and mix my leaves into it in the fall.

For the most part I'm fertilizing with chicken litter and compost, and I have put a little milorganite down.

Yes, I know the arguments against milo for gardening but I have researched it and decided to use it.

I hope to gradually improve the soil in this area over time, but so far without any additional fertilizing my stuff is growing great! I give the plants a foliar shot of miracle gro every two weeks.

 

[jdmeth]

I'd be inclined to put a potato piece in a hole and fille with mulch. That should work even in sandy soil, and not require any fert. Any chemical fert kills all life in the soil, just supplying the plant with its NPK, but you'll have to keep using it because the soil will be dead. Better to use some compost rather than fert.

That is fine for your little garden but would be virtually impossible for a commercial grower. The field in front of my home has grown successive potato crops for the last 100 years. Last year was the farmers largest yield yet. With potato prices down this year and corn prices near record highs he planted corn in it this year. The corn is waist high now. For the last several years he had been double cropping it, pulling out the potatoes in May and after hilling the rows back up drilling in corn. Last year the corn yield was 160 bu per acre. This years crop was planted thicker to take advantage of the longer growing time. Might get 200 bu this year.

Farming in sand is like growing plants in a green house, the soil just holds the plant up. We use fumagents to kill soil born diseases, granualer pesticides to kill soil insects, herbicides to suppress weeds, fungicides to keep blig ht away, fertilizers with micro nutrants added to feed the plants. Cover crops are grown in the summer to add a little organic matter and to suppress weeds unless corn is double cropped. The corn stalks are chopped back in to add the organic matter.

 

[Williy]

I buy the large spuds from the grocery store and when they sprout
I have seed to plant. I believe the spuds are from a local farmer.
I will plant them in a tub near the bottom and put dirt around them
as they grow.

willy

 

[HEC]

Chicken manure should be a year old as it is very hot for plants as they will burn so to speak . Potatoes need to be spread out to dry before storing so they won't rot . They do not need to cure to eat .

 

[Cougsfan]

I read that I would need to cure them, then store at 40-50 degrees and 95% humidity if I wanted 6-8 months of storage. I read that if I can't duplicate that I am good for more like 2-3 months.

Those are the conditions used in the large potato storages used by Potato farmers and processers in the Northwest US. I have seen potatoes stored safely in those controlled conditions for 18-19 months without going bad (I have also seen them stored 3 months and they go bad, if the potatoes were of poor quality to begin).
Curing (called suberization) is essentially removing the field heat as soon and quickly as possible. The goal is to bring the core temperature of the potato down to the storage temperature. The key to long term successful storage is keeping storage cool and the humidity as high as possible without reaching 100% humidity. If the skin of the potato gets wet through condensing conditions the potato will quickly begin to rot due to the wet skin inhibiting the ability for the potato to respirate (consuming oxygen and emitting co2). A lack of moisture will cause the product to shrivel (shrink in size) thru accelerated respiration.
I agree it is tough to maintain these commercial storage conditions in a private home. One of the best ways I have seen it done is to store the potatoes in a cool place in a bucket full of moist (Not wet!) sand. If stored for a long tome you might have to add a few oz of water every once in a while.
The other key is to start with healthy potatoes.
Either light or elevated temperature will cause sprouting.

 

[Cougsfan]

Some of the largest and highest quality potatoes I have seen have been grown in pure sand. But it is a practice I don't really believe in because you have to use a lot of water and a lot of fertilizer to make it work because of the lack of nutrients in sand.