Posts Tagged potatoes
Harvesting the first potatoes of 2010
The time has come to harvest the first of the potatoes. When the eyes were planted, they broke through the ground at different rates. So that means that the plants may mature at different times, and the harvest will be spread out.
When is it time to harvest potatoes?
A lot of people ask the question – when do you know when its time to harvest potatoes. Its a simple question and a simple answer – when the tops of the plants start dying, its time to dig the potatoes up.
If you have access to a tractor, a plow can be mounted to the rear end. The tractor is slowly driven over the row, as the soil is turned up, the potatoes roll out the ground. People can then walk behind the tractor, dig through the dirt and harvest the potatoes.
If your harvesting the potatoes by hand, dig around the base of the plant, or just pull up the plant to gain access to the buried potatoes.
Try not to use sharp hand tools – such as shovels – which can slice through the tender skin of the potato.
On May 30, 2010 – we harvested about 4 gallons of snap beans and 5 gallons of potatoes. I think the production of the snap beans is being stunted due to the lack of rain. For the year 2010, in just the first 5 months, we are somewhere around 4 – 6 inches below normal. If we would have received our normal rate of rain fall in April and May, I suspect that the beans and potatoes would produced a lot more.
Related Forum Post:
Kevs 2010 spring garden
Gardening Forum
Forum threads about potatoes
Planting a community garden
In these tough economic times, its important for people to come together. ne way that families can work together to safe money, is to plant a community garden.
In this example, 3 families, it breaks down to 11 people, 6 adults and 5 children are working together to plant a garden. This garden will be shared equally between everyone involved.l
The land we are planting on belongs to my step son and step daughter. Its some family land their grandfather left them after he passed away a few years ago. I’am guessing the plot we are using in the video is about 1/4 acre. There is another plot we are going to plant water melons on. And a smaller spot we are going to plant okra on.
Planting potatoes, peas and corn
Potatoes, peas and corn – plant them in that order.
Commercial grade fertilizer has 3 numbers, such as 13-13-13. Those three numbers stand for nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium (also called Pot Ash).
nitrogen – large leaves, tall growth – greens, spinach, corn, okra
phosphorus – root growth – potatoes, turnips
potassium / pot ash – pod production – peas, beans, corn, okra, squash
Potatoes – use fertilizers with a high middle number, such as 10-20-10 fertilizer. The higher phosphorus content helps promote root growth. The potatoes can be harvested and eaten at anytime. Just dig around the base of the potato plant and pull out the potatoes when you want some to cook. Or, wait until the top of the plant dies, then you know the potatoes are full grown and ready to harvest.
Fresh Potatoes
Fresh Potatoes just pulled up.
Potatoes
Harvesting Home Grown Potatoes
Growing potatoes is a pretty easy and straight forward process.
Once the tops of the potato plants start to die off. Which is usually about 3 or 4 months after planting, just pull the top of the potato plant up and then dig the dirt up around the plant. The potatoes will be easy to damage, so dig up with care. Try not to use tools such as shovels as they can damge the potato.
Some people use cloth gardening gloves to help protect their hands from injury (from debris in the dirt) and to prevent getting dirt under their finger nails. One way to quickly harvest the potatoes is to run a plow down the middle of the row. This will roll the dirt up and bring the potatoes to the surface.
After the potatoes have been Harvested, store them in a cool dry place. Some people will put down a bed of straw, layer of potatoes, layer of straw, layer of potatoes. When they need the potatoes, dig through the straw and dig some out.