"Bob Hobden" wrote in message
...

"Kase" wrote ..
"Bob Hobden" wrote..
"Kase" wrote...
I may have this years seed potatoes in the garage waiting to be chitted,
but the volunteers from last year are already well under way. I've dug
over last years potato patch today and found a lot of very edible left
overs (quite big lates and second earlies - about 15 kilos in total and
I've still got another 1/4 of the plot to go). But there were quite a
few potatoes that had decided to start growning, and had about 3 inches
of root and 1 inch of stalk. I had half expected them to be totally dead
thanks to this years hard frosts up here in South Manchester, but I
would say that the cold has improved the lates in flavour by quite a
lot. This is the second year that I've stored the potatoes in the ground
that they grew in, and it is two successes in a row - who needs to learn
how to build a clamp ;-)


Don't you have slugs in Manchester? We have to get our spuds up before
we lose the lot.


For me it is a dilemma of 'the least losses'. I grew British Queen as the
second early and it succumbed to blight within about 5 nanoseconds of
producing a crop, but it was a lovely crop of extremely white tubers with
no flaws and even right through to yesterday (21 Feb) the slugs have not
touched it in the ground.

The maincrop was Picasso, which produced a huge crop but tasted vile
(like blight would taste if you could get past the smell!) when I
harvested the first lot, so I left them in the ground meaning to clear
them into the 'green' bin for the council to sell to apartment dwellers.
Yesterday as I was finally clearing them I noticed that 2/3 of the crop
were still 'clean' although the rest were like sardine tins for slugs -
black slugs, packed densely inside the tubers. So I tasted a couple of
the clean ones and they were lovely and starchy, with a King Edward
flavour - result!

The issue about 'the least losses' is that in the previous 3 years to the
2 where I have left the tubers in the ground, the stored potatoes have
rotted in the middle starting after two weeks and with none left after
four weeks. That doesn't even get me to Christmas! So leaving them in the
ground, whilst unfortunately leaving something for the slugs, provides
for me through most of the winter


Even though we don't have a cold enough shed to store our spuds in what we
have left are still fine with only the odd one or two beginning to sprout.
Even the Kestral (SE) are still OK.
They shouldn't rot in storage unless they have blight or are badly damaged
with slugs or have been put away wet. After being placed on the floor to
dry we use or throw away all the slugged ones and any that are doubtful,
possibly with blight, before we sack them up into paper sacks. If blight
has been a problem, like last year, we then tip each sack out weekly for
the first month to ensure none are rotting. After that the occasional
sniff in the sack will tell you if something is wrong.
The key is sorting out the rubbish that won't store before sacking up.

--
Regards
Bob Hobden


Yep, undoubtedly it's the blight. Even though I chop off the haulms at the
first sign, have a five year rotation to avoid spores carrying over (I keep
good records), discard all potato, tomato and pepper foliage in the green
bin and then dry the tubers in the sun for half a day (yes we did have some
sun, hard as it may be to believe - lol), store them in the garage (constant
cool temperature in winter) in fruit trays with mesh bottoms, when the
blight has them it finishes them even if they look perfect to start with,
tick, tick, tick, tick, pop - ewww!! It's probably thanks to the nightshades
growing up the trees at the bottom of the garden, and the neighbours
gardens, and their neighbours.

Somehow, for the last two seasons, they have held off the blight much better
in the ground for me. Every potato has a life of 2-4 weeks out of the
ground, so I'll stick with leaving them until I need them and if/when that
is no longer working, I'll try something else - lol

Kase