my husband planted some potatoes in a medium sized pot and they have grown shoots that look healthy to about 2/3 of a foot high what now do we completely cover them shoots or what sorry this is our first time to grow anything veg except our tomatoes we know you add soil but not sure how much thank you this forum rocks you dont seem to mind helping little newbies like me :-D
Hiyah. I only grow early potatoes, but I do earth them up 2 or three times. I would suggest that you earth your plants up , but leave some leaves showing. Extra spuds will grow out from the covered stretch of stem that you earth up. I plant my spuds very deep AND earth-up, and I get huge amounts of potatos on each plant. Good luck with yours and keep us posted on their please.
thank you sjoerd we will try it it was like a trial run see if we get anything so i will add more earth and see what becomes if we can plant deeper we will get bigger pots as this is only relatively shallow
Ok PT...but next year be careful how much earth you add--remember what happened to G'mama. BTW...have you ever thought of growing them in bags of garden soil? Some folks do. That way you can take out about half the soil and then add it back in as the plant grows. Just be sure to poke drainage holes in the bottom of the bags if you use them.
I actually use spoiled hay to "earth up". I place the seed taters directly on the ground and cover with at least 6-8 in of hay. I use additional hay to cover the foliage when I need to earth up. They all you have to do is pull away the hay to harvest the taters. No digging.
thats a good idea flower power, i will maybe try that especially with them being in a tub. You have all given me a lot of great information i like the idea of the sack also
Flower, do you use ONLY hay? No dirt at all? This is my final try at growing potatoes if the crop isn't at least a wee bit productive. I am waiting for the foliage to die so I can dig the potatoes I hope.
Our potato plants are beginning to die and I see a tiny bit of a potato above ground. It's green and I know we cannot eat the green part, but it encourages me that we may actually have potatoes this year! Must the vines die completely before digging?
I never wait until the vines are completely die before harvestiung...but then, I grow earlies only. Do you know what kind yours are--early, main or late?
mine are anya potatoes planted from a potato we got them from the store, I have no clue about growing them but the vines look really healthy
The Anya is a 'tater that was bread from a 'Pink Fir' and a 'Desiree'. it is technically known as a "second early" and can be lifted from July. This meands that you don't really have to wait until the plant dies and turns brown. You can lift the spuds during flowering or or the end of the flowering, depending upon how much rain the plants are getting.
Great thank you sjoerd but that sounds as though ive made a mistake planting the couple i have in july!!! though my garden thinks it is spring with the hyacinths popping up, wonder if the potatoes will come to anything ,if not I will try to use my brain and plant for the right season next year, they have got quite wet as we have ahd lots of rain which bothers me a bit after whata happened to gardenmamma,but the tub theyre in has good drainage just thinking I need to earth them up again. The vines are quite big, oh well i guess we learn by our mistakes i will see what i find in the tub when i pull them, thank you so much for the information they are my favourite small potato.
You are welcome. I can't wait to see what you harvest. It5's always so exciting, I would advise you to buy your taters through a garden center or an online shop so that you can be assured of getting "clean" seed potatos. I know that there are lots and lots of folks that just plant what they buy from the supermarket, but there is often enough various sicknesses that are in them. Perhaps you have peeled and cut a potato and noticed discoloured areas, this is as often as not Phytophthora and if you would happen to plant one of these it you could develop a sick plant if the spud survived lomng enough to even make a plant...then there is the problem of introducing sicknesses into your soil or spreading spores on the wind. Of course these are only my own ideas, and as I said, there are lots of folks that plant store-bought potatos. We are not allowed to on our allotment complex becaause of the reasons that I have just mentioned. They even have a sort of "Potato Police" as we call them , that come around and check the plants for sickness and the certificates of fitness for the taters that we plant. hahaha. It all sounds exaggerated perhaps, but with allotments so close to eachother it is a necessity to protect healthy potato and tomato plants and fruits, as the blight can run through a complex like wildfire. Well, good luck with these spuds and have fun learning about and looking up tasty spuds to try for next year.
