Potatoes?

I'm new to SFG and I have 2 4X4 and one 2x2 tall box. Does anyone know anything about potatoes. They are growing like weeds and I don't know anything about when to harvest. my carrots are little bitty but my squash is taking off.

You'll have to tell us what type of potato they are .. first early ,second early , main crop ,or late crop

As a rough guide the first two are of eatable size just as they come into flower bloom .. the main crop after the flowers have died off and the last leave them in the ground as long as you dare but not till the frost arrives .

Today I have had to cover the stems of my potatoes as they were just over 8 inches above the MM I planted them in . They now have a jacket of 6 inches of MM to carryon growing through to produce more potatoes .

My potatoes are growing in big square bags sat on concrete , some out side and some in the grenhouse. So I do not have to get as involved with them as you will with yours .

Have your got and read Mel Bartholomew's book ( 2006 edition ) called " All New Square Foot Gardening ". If not please do try and get a copy for in it there is a section that shows the use of a stackable box that sits on top of a one foot square of the MM in the bed ,

The bottom less stackable boxes are specially for growing long rooted crops and using them to " Hill up " potatoes.

Yardtigress wrote:I'm new to SFG and I have 2 4X4 and one 2x2 tall box. Does anyone know anything about potatoes. They are growing like weeds and I don't know anything about when to harvest. my carrots are little bitty but my squash is taking off.

The potatoes will tell you when it's time to harvest. When the tops start to die off naturally is a good time to test, then go from there.

Large scale farmers use a herbicide (with all of its consequences) to kill the potato plants so that they can all be harvested at the same time. You don't have to do that.

Tom

Tom

Over here sometimes they use a heavily diluted sulphuric acid to kill & dessicate the tops to reduce potato blight spores , apparently the the acid can help in chalky soils as well as reduce a few very close to surface bugs & slugs.

The potatoes I planted are yukon gold. I should be planting some Georgia Jet sweet potatoes later this week. Thanks for all the help.

Okay, so I'm an extreme newbie to gardening in general, and I'm one of those people that has to know everything so this is probably an annoying question.

But, I planted a bunch of Red Pontiac potatoes and Yukon golds back on 3/27. They grew like crazy and I hilled them closer to every other day than once per week with the extreme growth. About 2 weeks ago I hit my final height and those plants are still growing and looking very healthy, but show absolutely no signs of flowering. I'm tempted to dig one up to see what's there, but I'm afraid that it won't survive if I replant it. Anyone have any idea how long until it flowers and I can harvest (I'm in zone 7a)?

Maybe me and a garden was not a good idea, I'm not very patient and it's not exactly an exact science!

Time to move onto to something else for a while and learn patience. If the plants are green and look happy they are busy making tubers. It's going to be a few months before it's time for potatoes. Click the link below for more info.
Red Pontiac Potatoes

Hi to all those NEasterners. Is it possible to grow sweet potatoes or yams this far north? I have a couple of old orange bags I thought I might put a plant in just for experiment sake.

I am planning on growing some sweet potatoes this season. You will need slips. I am not putting mine in until the very end of May or the beginning of June.

I'm attempting to grow my own slips from a purple okinawian sweet potato purchased at a farmers market. The sweet looked healthy and I'll keep it in a container so the worse that will happen is I have an unusable crop if I even get that far.

So far, it's been a little over a week with the potato half in a bowl of water in a somewhat sunny window. I'm debating moving it to the green house, which will be warmer, but zone to be too warm to get it going better, but I'm having some success. I have 5 or so little nubby slip sprouts about 1/8th inch high on the spud.

So I'm loathe to change anything, but need to get the gas peddle on the floor as I want them in mid-June.

I dug around in my potato box (Red Norland) this evening, just because I wanted to see lol. I took out two little guys... one a bit smaller than golf ball and the other about half that size. They've been growing about a month. I'll probably give the whole box another month and then dump them:

Thanks for the picture Carolina girl. I have mine in a bed instead of a bin, but your potatoes are about the size I want to pick them at. One of my fondest memories from childhood is going to my Grandmas (in Wisconsin) in the summer and having her go out to the garden, dig up a couple "new potatoes" and making parsley butter potatoes right away. I don't think there's much in the world that tasted better than those fresh dug potatoes. Anyway, I might just have to go out there tomorrow and dig up a plant to see what I got, I planted 12 squares at 4/sq so I'm thinking it might be okay if I lose one plant to curiosity!

You can get away with just sticking your hand down into the mix and rooting around until you find a tater, no need to uproot a whole plant that could be making 20 more spuds. Just a thought. Let us know what you find on your treasure hunt

I did a little research on Sweet Potatoes and although I love them.... There is a lot of extra stuff you need to do to cure them. Anyway, I was hoping there might be some suggestions out there for what kind of potato to try first. We like them all, so pickiness is not an issue, but resiliency against bugs, disease, and mostly the gardener are!

Thanks

hruten wrote:I did a little research on Sweet Potatoes and although I love them.... There is a lot of extra stuff you need to do to cure them. Anyway, I was hoping there might be some suggestions out there for what kind of potato to try first. We like them all, so pickiness is not an issue, but resiliency against bugs, disease, and mostly the gardener are!

Thanks

I think you may have to settle on what ever slips you can find at the nursery across the river. For information try looking at Folia for good info on sweet potatoes or regular potatoes.

Thanks Cmprn!!

I'm not sure that it's said enough, but you and the other moderators are WONDERFUL and patient!

kgooding wrote:Anyone have any idea how long until it flowers and I can harvest (I'm in zone 7a)?

I wouldn't touch them until they are ready. You will be rewarded if you wait.

Thanks for all the links Camprn and the information from all. The potatoes I have in my 'tater tires' are red pontiac. The trouble is at day 78 they are starting to look sick. and unless this is a flower this test might be a bust.

The link Camprn provided said 95+ days till mature, and that is the grow time. I am hopine this damage is from the wind we had last week.

If anyone is interested...I dug around a few of the biggest of my potato plants tonight just to see what might be there. Now, my plants are hilled to about 18" but I planted the seed potatoes at about 5 " of depth, so when I felt around down there I actually felt to around 12 inches. Guess what I found? Absolutely nothing! Well, I felt the stems going down and a few roots, but not any tubers. So, obviously I'm just getting way over excited and need to wait at least another month before I dig around again!

Thanks for everyone's help!

pepper that does look like a flower about to open some of our flowers last year were tiny white/purple flowers....and you may only get a few......

your plants look like they are doing what they should be doing at 78 days....they do take at least 90 days or more depending on how long it took them to germ ....and....they will look really pitiful-dying-droopy....like they need water but dont.....the longer you wait the bigger your taters and more taters you will get too.....i get so excited when i start to see our taters dying off.....LOL....they will get ugly

hugs

rose

THANK YOU Rose

The 78 day are since planting. That pitifull excuse for a flower has been around for several days. I was about to pull the tire towers down. You see this is my first year gardening I have not been able to find a flower for these taters. I have been "concerned" about them getting too hot being above ground and 'dressed' in black.

Now I can wait in peace for the time to pass.........

THANKS AGAIN FOR THE VIVID DESCRIPTION.

found last years potato thread started by asking how and what to use to *hill up* potatoes....but....we continued the thread and posted pic's thru out the growing and harvesting of potatoes....there is A Lot of great info in there on potatoes along with a little bit of fun the thread is a little long LOL...but heck...we had fun!

https://squarefoot.forumotion.com/t7438-potatoes

hope that helps

hugs

rose

Rose you were right the thread was long but to me well worth the read. You gave me the strenght to WAIT. Thank you again