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harvesting and storing potatos

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  • 14-07-2011 12:13pm
    #1
    sponge_bob
    Registered Users Posts: 665 ✭✭✭


    i planted half my potatos in the last week or two of apiril and the other half a few weeks later, probably 100 plants in total.
    the first lot have started to flower about a week ago and the second lot are just starting to get flower buds. do i wait for the flowers to fall off before i dig them? and what is the best way to store them.
    of course myself and the wife are gone on diets which involves cutting out potatos and bread, and the kids are not big potato eaters, so apart from sampling a few of the fresh new spuds we will have to store them for the next month or two until we are finished our diets


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    #2
    brian_t
    Registered Users Posts: 6,695 ✭✭✭brian_t


    If you are not going to eat them immediately why not leave them continue growing in the ground until the haulms start to die off naturally.
    You will of course have to keep spraying them against blight.


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    #3
    redser7
    Registered Users Posts: 2,730 ✭✭✭redser7


    Out of interest, assuming you keep them disease free, how long can you keep a main crop in the ground as a means to store them?
    Cheers


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    #4
    fodda
    Registered Users Posts: 947 ✭✭✭fodda


    www.grow-your-own.ie/potatoes.html

    There is a section at bottom of the page on storing your spuds.


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    #5
    fodda
    Registered Users Posts: 947 ✭✭✭fodda


    redser7 wrote: »
    Out of interest, assuming you keep them disease free, how long can you keep a main crop in the ground as a means to store them?
    Cheers

    Potatoes store according to many factors but a large factor is temperature.

    Saying that some potato varieties do not store well at all and others do to varying degrees, meaning some store better/longer than others.


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    #6
    Corsendonk
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,871 ✭✭✭Corsendonk


    You can risk it and leave them in the ground overwinter, wasn't such a great option for the farmers the last couple of harsh winters. Otherwise later in the year dig up all your spuds, store in hemp sacks in a cool pest proof shed or you can create a potato bin which is a large wooden box in the shed and cover with cardboard to keep the light out. If the potatoes you planted were new seed and you had no major disease problems you can select out seed from your yield for next years crop.


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    #7
    jprboy
    Registered Users Posts: 1,353 ✭✭✭jprboy


    Corsendonk wrote: »
    You can risk it and leave them in the ground overwinter, wasn't such a great option for the farmers the last couple of harsh winters. Otherwise later in the year dig up all your spuds, store in hemp sacks in a cool pest proof shed or you can create a potato bin which is a large wooden box in the shed and cover with cardboard to keep the light out. If the potatoes you planted were new seed and you had no major disease problems you can select out seed from your yield for next years crop.

    Good advice. One word of caution, though, a cool shed can become a freezer in the types of temperatures we've experienced for the last 2 winters. Found this out the hard way last December when the remainder of my crop was destroyed in the garage, where temps rarely drop so low.


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    #8
    mjcom4d
    Closed Accounts Posts: 145 ✭✭mjcom4d


    What breed are they


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    #9
    Corsendonk
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,871 ✭✭✭Corsendonk


    mjcom4d wrote: »
    What breed are they

    I think you mean variety, breed is used when talking about animals not plants. :D


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    #10
    mjcom4d
    Closed Accounts Posts: 145 ✭✭mjcom4d


    Corsendonk wrote: »
    mjcom4d wrote: »
    What breed are they

    I think you mean variety, breed is used when talking about animals not plants. :D

    Breed variety
    Tomato tomatoe


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    #11
    Corsendonk
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,871 ✭✭✭Corsendonk


    mjcom4d wrote: »
    Breed variety
    Tomato tomatoe

    What breed of ice cream do you like?:D


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    #12
    fodda
    Registered Users Posts: 947 ✭✭✭fodda


    Corsendonk wrote: »
    I think you mean variety, breed is used when talking about animals not plants. :D

    Not when you have the latest GM spuds:eek:


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    #13
    mjcom4d
    Closed Accounts Posts: 145 ✭✭mjcom4d


    Corsendonk wrote: »
    mjcom4d wrote: »
    Breed variety
    Tomato tomatoe

    What breed of ice cream do you like?:D

    99

    What's your favourite breed a spud


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    #14
    Corsendonk
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,871 ✭✭✭Corsendonk


    mjcom4d wrote: »
    99

    What's your favourite breed a spud

    My favourite variety is Homeguards, yours? I don't breed spuds do, that would be cross-fertilising two variesties to create a new variety, do you?


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    #15
    mjcom4d
    Closed Accounts Posts: 145 ✭✭mjcom4d


    Corsendonk wrote: »
    mjcom4d wrote: »
    99

    What's your favourite breed a spud

    My favourite variety is Homeguards, yours? I don't breed spuds do, that would be cross-fertilising two variesties to create a new variety, do you?

    Rooster are the job bred by teagasc in the 90s afaik


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    #16
    Corsendonk
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,871 ✭✭✭Corsendonk


    mjcom4d wrote: »
    Rooster are the job bred by teagasc in the 90s afaik

    Ahh so Teagasc breed and you grow the variety Rooster. Glad you figured that out.


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    #17
    mjcom4d
    Closed Accounts Posts: 145 ✭✭mjcom4d


    Corsendonk wrote: »
    mjcom4d wrote: »
    Rooster are the job bred by teagasc in the 90s afaik

    Ahh so Teagasc breed and you grow the variety Rooster. Glad you figured that out.

    Teagasc bred it and it's a breed my grandfather planted different breeds of spuds so did me father now my turn to plant different spud breeds


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    #18
    doctor evil
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,114 ✭✭✭doctor evil


    I have a renegrade Rooster growing in the garden next to the Kara (I think). It must have been a tiny spud that escaped the fork.

    Its not doing half as well as the other, am I ok in leaving it or should I remove it.


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    #19
    sponge_bob
    Registered Users Posts: 665 ✭✭✭sponge_bob


    mjcom4d wrote: »
    What breed are they


    kerr pinks
    i dug one plant yesterday and had about 3 fullsize spuds and 6-7 really small ones. so i think i will be leaving them for another week or two yet


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    #20
    Corsendonk
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,871 ✭✭✭Corsendonk


    mjcom4d wrote: »
    Teagasc bred it and it's a breed my grandfather planted different breeds of spuds so did me father now my turn to plant different spud breeds

    Let me guess cattle farmer?


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    #21
    Corsendonk
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,871 ✭✭✭Corsendonk


    sponge_bob wrote: »
    kerr pinks
    i dug one plant yesterday and had about 3 fullsize spuds and 6-7 really small ones. so i think i will be leaving them for another week or two yet

    Mid August if Pinks,the longer you leave them the more yield, you should taste the difference too, the ones you dig in August shouldbe more flowery than the ones you dug today.


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    #22
    fodda
    Registered Users Posts: 947 ✭✭✭fodda


    Dig spuds when tops have wilted and died back.


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    #23
    sponge_bob
    Registered Users Posts: 665 ✭✭✭sponge_bob


    fodda wrote: »
    Dig spuds when tops have wilted and died back.


    kinda thought that, iam only remembering when i was a youngfella and the father allways had spuds growing in the back, and pretty sure we used to wait till the flowers fell off before harvesting them


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    #24
    mjcom4d
    Closed Accounts Posts: 145 ✭✭mjcom4d


    Corsendonk wrote: »
    mjcom4d wrote: »
    Teagasc bred it and it's a breed my grandfather planted different breeds of spuds so did me father now my turn to plant different spud breeds

    Let me guess cattle farmer?

    Yup


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    #25
    redser7
    Registered Users Posts: 2,730 ✭✭✭redser7


    Off-topic but how many plants or how long a trench of main crop would produce the equivelant of a 4 stone bag of spuds? Trying to work out the layout of my allotment for next year. Cheers


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    #26
    fodda
    Registered Users Posts: 947 ✭✭✭fodda


    Estimates are around 140kg per person but the yield will be different for each variety.


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    #27
    brian_t
    Registered Users Posts: 6,695 ✭✭✭brian_t


    fodda wrote: »
    Estimates are around 140kg per person but the yield will be different for each variety.

    Do you mean 14kg per plant ??


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    #28
    fodda
    Registered Users Posts: 947 ✭✭✭fodda


    brian_t wrote: »
    Do you mean 14kg per plant ??

    That would be a potato plant:) No 140kg consumption by Irish people.


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    #29
    Corsendonk
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,871 ✭✭✭Corsendonk


    mjcom4d wrote: »
    Yup

    A little off topic but you wouldnt know anyone that could deliver 2-4 tractor trailer loads of well rotten Farm Yard Manure to North Co Dub? I posted in the farming forum and no one responsed, I think I put them off when I asked for no rubbish in it, last couple of times I got deliveries I found everything from plastic bottles to grooming brushes in it.


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    #30
    redser7
    Registered Users Posts: 2,730 ✭✭✭redser7


    Here you go, free delivery around leinster.

    http://www.adverts.ie/other-home-garden/top-soil-farmyard-compost-manure-topsoil/615969

    Can't vouch for them at all.


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