I am a novice gardener and have planted seed potatoes and expect a crop very
soon. I have a lot of foliage which is now flowering but have no idea when
to harvest. I have watered well during the hot weather.

The type of potatoes are Charlotte, Highland Burgundy Red main crop and
Salad Blue second early.

Is there a way of knowing when they are ready?

Thanks

"M" wrote

I am a novice gardener and have planted seed potatoes and expect a crop
very soon. I have a lot of foliage which is now flowering but have no
idea when to harvest. I have watered well during the hot weather.

The type of potatoes are Charlotte, Highland Burgundy Red main crop and
Salad Blue second early.

Is there a way of knowing when they are ready?


Charlotte is a First Early so should be ready soon, especially if flowering.
Scrape away a bit of soil and see what you can find.
Salad Blue as a second early will probably take another few weeks or you
could leave it to die back before lifting.
Highland Burgandy Red as a maincrop should be left to die back in the autumn
before lifting and storing.

--
Regards
Bob Hobden
W.of London. UK

On May 30, 12:22*am, "M" wrote:
I am a novice gardener and have planted seed potatoes and expect a crop very
soon. *I have a lot of foliage which is now flowering but have no idea when
to harvest. I have watered well during the hot weather.

The type of potatoes are Charlotte, Highland Burgundy Red main crop and
Salad Blue second early.

Is there a way of knowing when they are ready?

Thanks

Dig a plant up and have a look. Generally by the time flowers appear,
there is something there.
In a few weeks now, blight will probably start to appear on
susceptable varieties. So if there are potaotos there, may as well eat
them!

I have given upon these blue thingies. Just a novelty and foul tasting
in my experience.

Here is a link to harvesting and storing potatoes.
HTH

"Martin" wrote ...

harry wrote:

I have given upon these blue thingies. Just a novelty and foul tasting
in my experience.

Us too. I am sick of novelty potatoes.



Depends what you mean by novelty, we tried Mayan Twilight last year and are
growing it again this year, make wonderful sauté potatoes. They are also a
Tomato leafed Potato, quite distinctive.

--
Regards
Bob Hobden
W.of London. UK

"Janet" wrote in message
...
In article ,
says...

I am a novice gardener and have planted seed potatoes and expect a crop
very
soon. I have a lot of foliage which is now flowering but have no idea
when
to harvest. I have watered well during the hot weather.

The type of potatoes are Charlotte, Highland Burgundy Red main crop and
Salad Blue second early.

Is there a way of knowing when they are ready?

When they start flowering, you can gently fossick around one plant's
roots to see what's there. Always lift one or two plants to enjoy the very
first, tiny marble-sized crop; steamed, buttered, salted, scoffed.

But really, when to harvest depends on when and how you plan to eat the
potatoes. Are you growing for economy or culinary quality? If you plan to
grow a big maincrop to store and feed you all winter, you will need dark
dry cool but frost free storage for them.

I much prefer to grow potatoes (and any veg) to eat them at their optimum
point, dug fresh from the ground all summer..because you can't buy that
freshness and flavour. So I grow earlies and lates just to extend the
supply of small fresh potatoes. I don't aim to grow huge potatoes for
baking. At the end of summer I lift clean and sort whatever's left, and
they will all be eaten by November. We eat shop potatoes from November
till the new garden crop in June.

Janet.


Grow them on the surface on a bed of compost but under black plastic, and
you will always have 'straight from the garden spuds' because you can lift
the plastic and "pick the ready ones"

Been there. Done that. Got a massive crop. (Actually tooooooooooooo many for
us so we supplied the neighbours)

Mike


--

....................................
Remember, a statue has never been erected to a critic.
....................................

On May 30, 4:33*pm, "Bob Hobden" wrote:
"Martin" *wrote ...



harry wrote:

I have given upon these blue thingies. Just a novelty and foul tasting
in my experience.

Us too. I am sick of novelty potatoes.

Depends what you mean by novelty, we tried Mayan Twilight last year and are
growing it again this year, make wonderful sauté potatoes. *They are also a
Tomato leafed Potato, quite distinctive.

--
Regards
Bob Hobden
W.of London. UK

If you ever travel in Peru or Ecuador, (home of potatos) they have a
huge range of potatos in the markets there. Fifty or sixty different
sorts. Things you never see here.
There is one that is apparently poisonous until it has been frosted.
It's blue one too, so look out! Heh Heh!

On May 30, 12:03*pm, Martin wrote:
On Mon, 30 May 2011 00:26:07 -0700 (PDT), harry
wrote:

I have given upon these blue thingies. Just a novelty and foul tasting
in my experience.

Us too. I am sick of novelty potatoes.
--

Martin

We boiled ours and ended up with blues water and grey tasteless
potatos.

harry wrote:
On May 30, 12:03 pm, Martin wrote:
On Mon, 30 May 2011 00:26:07 -0700 (PDT), harry
wrote:

I have given upon these blue thingies. Just a novelty and foul
tasting in my experience.

Us too. I am sick of novelty potatoes.
--

Martin

We boiled ours and ended up with blues water and grey tasteless
potatos.

I've never understood why anyone would want to eat a blue potato. Not since
the days of Fanny Cradock and her infamous vegetable dyes anyway

I grew potatoes last year for the first time. They were just supermarket
ones and I forgot the varieties, but they were earlies. I just left them
until my greed got the best of me and cautiously dug one up to see what was
beneath.


Ian