Potato Tending

Ha, fruitless potato beetle fornication; they're dead

Today I finally 'hilled-up' the fingerling potatoes planted in late May. Potatoes grow new tubers off of lateral shoots coming off of the stem growing from the seed potato, and burying the lower portions of the green foliage is a requisite for a good potato harvest. Or so I've read. It provides more stem/branch intersections from which to grow new potatoes sheltered from the bitter alkaloid forming effects of sunlight.

Dark mounds of top-soil prior to tilling and hilling

I planted these potatoes late, and I'm probably hilling them up a little late too. Spending more time with the spuds, I also noticed and killed a half-dozen potato beetles. They make a loud crunch between two rocks and lay these day-glow orange eggs on the bottom of leaves. They squish rather than crunch.

Cultivating between rows of buried 'taters

I planted these potatoes in rows that were a little too raised above the surrounding soil. I've had to add a cheap sandy top-soil mix, tilled with the native clay soil, to the inter spaces between the rows in order to have enough soil to pull up and over the lower portion of the growing stems. The new tiller with a 17" wide tiller box fits perfectly between the rows and makes easy work of the compacted clay.

Fingerling Potatoes

Chitting in the front window

Potatoes should generally go into the ground around May 1st in this region, but I'm still going to plant a late crop of three different types of fingerling potatoes. They should be ready for the farmers' market by mid-August. Harder to find than regular potatoes (still available @ the Holiday Nursery), I ordered 15 lbs. of the Russian Banana, La Ratte, and Rose Finn fingerling potatoes from Peaceful Valley Farm Supply.

First glimpse of light

They cost the steep price of $4.99/lb, but should return quite a bit of that at the market. After receiving a tightly packed box from the growers in Colorado, I began chitting (pre-sprouting) the potatoes by placing them upright in empty planting trays and exposing them to medium light. Normally you would avoid allowing potatoes to green (the color denotes the bitter alkaloids found in the greenery of all members of the nightshade family), but in seed potatoes it helps them get a quicker start once they get in the ground. Something I need, planting at the beginning of June. I'll plant these in a 25x4' row with 3 sandy soil filled trenches in the natural clay soil of the row. Then I'll try not to overwater them, and fend off the grasshoppers with Nolo bait. Fingers crossed.