A few guys at my allotment site have recently cut the haulms off their
maincrop potatoes. They give two reasons for this practice:

Firstly, it considerably reduces the risk of infection by blight.
Secondly, it prevents nutrients and plant energy going into the
production of the potato fruit/seeds.

As this is my first year at growing potatoes , I would welcome any
advice/comments as to cutting the haulms off at this time of year and
leaving the tubers in the ground until harvest time.

Ed
(SE England)

On Wed, 19 Aug 2009 16:57:42 +0100, Ed ex@directory wrote:

A few guys at my allotment site have recently cut the haulms off their
maincrop potatoes. They give two reasons for this practice:

Firstly, it considerably reduces the risk of infection by blight.
Secondly, it prevents nutrients and plant energy going into the
production of the potato fruit/seeds.

As this is my first year at growing potatoes , I would welcome any
advice/comments as to cutting the haulms off at this time of year and
leaving the tubers in the ground until harvest time.

Ed
(SE England)

Ed, I took all the top growth off my potatoes a while ago, before
blight showed itself, in order to avoid the blight getting into the
plants. The potatoes won't go on swelling though.
You are right that the flowers and fruit on potatoes will sap
nutrients. In this case all you need to do is remove the flowers as
they show.

Pam in Bristol

"Ed" ex@directory wrote in message
...
A few guys at my allotment site have recently cut the haulms off
their maincrop potatoes. They give two reasons for this practice:

Firstly, it considerably reduces the risk of infection by blight.
Secondly, it prevents nutrients and plant energy going into the
production of the potato fruit/seeds.

As this is my first year at growing potatoes , I would welcome any
advice/comments as to cutting the haulms off at this time of year
and leaving the tubers in the ground until harvest time.

Ed
(SE England)

The advice to remove haulms and leave the spuds in is widespread and
it is also pointless and wrong. If you do that you expose the tubers
near the surface to more light and they go green. Also if you look at
those tubers now you'll see little slug damage, leave 'em in and the
slugs will have a field day. The farmer neighbouring here had 300
acres for McCains and he's lifted those over the last couple of weeks.
I've just finished ours on the veg plot and what a crop it is - best
I've seen in years.

--
Rod

My real address is

Rod wrote:
"Ed" ex@directory wrote in message
...
A few guys at my allotment site have recently cut the haulms off
their maincrop potatoes. They give two reasons for this practice:

Firstly, it considerably reduces the risk of infection by blight.
Secondly, it prevents nutrients and plant energy going into the
production of the potato fruit/seeds.

As this is my first year at growing potatoes , I would welcome any
advice/comments as to cutting the haulms off at this time of year
and leaving the tubers in the ground until harvest time.

Ed
(SE England)

The advice to remove haulms and leave the spuds in is widespread and
it is also pointless and wrong. If you do that you expose the tubers
near the surface to more light and they go green. Also if you look at
those tubers now you'll see little slug damage, leave 'em in and the
slugs will have a field day. The farmer neighbouring here had 300
acres for McCains and he's lifted those over the last couple of weeks.
I've just finished ours on the veg plot and what a crop it is - best
I've seen in years.

That may be true, but I understand that it toughens the skins to help in
storing. I've noticed that local farmer cut his off last week, so I
followed suit. Last year I left mine on the surface of the ground to dry
our, left them too long, so a lot of green. :-((

--
Please reply to group,emails to designated
address are never read.

On 20 Aug, 16:31, Broadback wrote:
That may be true, but I understand that it toughens the skins to help in
storing. I've noticed that local farmer cut his off last week, so I
followed suit. Last year I left mine on the surface of the ground to dry
our, left them too long, so a lot of green. :-((

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address are never read.- Hide quoted text -

Not a problem if you handle them carefully. We don't use our last old
spuds until the first new ones are ready.

Ed wrote:

A few guys at my allotment site have recently cut the haulms off their
main crop potatoes. They give two reasons for this practice:

Firstly, it considerably reduces the risk of infection by blight.
Secondly, it prevents nutrients and plant energy going into the
production of the potato fruit/seeds.

As this is my first year at growing potatoes , I would welcome any
advice/comments as to cutting the haulms off at this time of year and
leaving the tubers in the ground until harvest time.

Ed
(SE England)

Had to look up haulm to see what you were talking about, oh stems, okay.
We don't harvest until the stems have dried, gives the potatoes a chance
to develop a good tough skin for keeping or just to make sure they are
covered with hay, dirt, whatever, so the potatoes wont be sunburned, turn
green. Could leave them in the ground too, cover with hay to keep them
from freezing (but sometimes they'll start to sprout too) then dig as
needed. Oh, the stems can be left on or cut off after dried but leave
enough to see where the hill was.
--
signature goes here

On 24 Aug 2009 19:25:45 GMT, Bud wrote:

Ed wrote:

A few guys at my allotment site have recently cut the haulms off their
main crop potatoes. They give two reasons for this practice:

Firstly, it considerably reduces the risk of infection by blight.
Secondly, it prevents nutrients and plant energy going into the
production of the potato fruit/seeds.

As this is my first year at growing potatoes , I would welcome any
advice/comments as to cutting the haulms off at this time of year and
leaving the tubers in the ground until harvest time.

Ed
(SE England)

Had to look up haulm to see what you were talking about, oh stems, okay.
We don't harvest until the stems have dried, gives the potatoes a chance
to develop a good tough skin for keeping or just to make sure they are
covered with hay, dirt, whatever, so the potatoes wont be sunburned, turn
green. Could leave them in the ground too, cover with hay to keep them
from freezing (but sometimes they'll start to sprout too) then dig as
needed. Oh, the stems can be left on or cut off after dried but leave
enough to see where the hill was.

Gives them a chance to develop blight also. Taking them off, and
harvesting early gives you a smaller crop but ensures you get some. I
only grow earlies now, no main-crop.

Pam in Bristol