"Fran" wrote in message
u...
"Noah Simoneaux" wrote in message
...

I've noticed that many gardening books ignore potatoes, since they're so
cheap
to buy in the store it just doesn't pay to grow them at home. Just try
finding
some of the better varieties for home gardeners and taste them and the
store-bought potatoes will never taste the same for you. I've done that
with
tomatoes.

I think I'd ditch those gardening books as they are don't seem to know
much
about a very important subject :-))

Having just looked through some of my books I notice that a lot of them
that
I use most regularly emphasise the importance of growing even a few
potatoes
in even a restricted garden space. These books all seem to stress the
same
point which I find of most importance: - that it is impossible to buy a
decent potato in any supermarket and finding a good spud is a very hard
task
if one doesn't have a garden.

I have found one shop which does supply good potatoes (in a very large
regional hunt) and they are still in the hessian (burlap) bag that comes
from the grower. It is a matter of digging in and getting ones hands
dirty
in order to get the potatoes but they ARE good potoatoes (unlike anything
that comes in a plastic bag).

Another good reason to plant potatos is that they are a good way to
condition the soil. They have a lot of foiliage, and after they start to
grow nothing grow under them and the underground growth opens up the soil.
We always planted potatoes where we had weed problems the year before
because they were so good at crowding out the weeds. And home grown
potatoes ar emuch better than store bought for some reason. At least so i
recall.