Topic: winter potatoes

[meg_gordon]

I've got four tubs of winter potatoes which were planted in September - but it looks as if the haulms are rotting - so worried that it might be blight.  Can you get blight this late in the year?  We have had high winds and heavy rain - so the weather might have whipped the poor plants about - but it looks as if they rotting - can I salvage anything?

Meg

[saddad]

It's very unlikely to be blight...
you could earth them up again... if you think the wind has damaged them... or firkle around and see if there is anything worth harvesting...  :-\

[chriscross1966]

Most likely it got too cold for them one night....get them into the shelter opf a GH or polytunnel.... there's precious little light at this time of year though , they'll take an age to do anything worthwhile..... If I want something that tastes like a new spud in the winter, well, that's what Pink Fir Apple is for.....

[meg_gordon]

Thanks for the responses guys - temperatures haven't fallen below 8 Deg C here yet - and they are sheltered beside a south facing wall.  Will move them into the (empty) greenhouse now - just in case the temperature does fall.  Saddad - they are earthed up to almost the top of the tubs which are about 2 feet tall.  Hope they are just bruised with the wind and rain. 

Meg
ps - I love PFAs, but just wanted to try and grow some winter tatties by myself - oh well....

[chriscross1966]

Heh heh... I know what you mean... I keep trying to remind myself to get some going in August.... but I was so snowed under by the tomato harvest this year I forgot.... What variety did you go for?... one of the issues with getting winter spuds to work is to find something that will grow, doesn't have a straight timer switch as it were and also tastes really good.... IIRC Pentland Javelin fulfils the first two, but although it's nice (and I love it for providing my first decent baked spuds of the year) it's not going to win a tastiest spud of the year award......

chrisc

[artichoke]

This will seem rather mad....I have some Charlottes sending out little sprouts in their paper sack, so I have put 5 in daylight to toughen up and chit some more.

Soon, on the grounds that volunteer potatoes survive the winter in the soil, I will bury them under a mass of straw and compost and fleece, and hope for the best. At worst I will have five frozen potatoes, at best really early potatoes next year?

[Robert_Brenchley]

It might work, but it sounds as though you're storing them a little too warm.

[artichoke]

Well, the chitting potatoes are out in the open now on my plot - I have noticed, while digging, a volunteer popping up with cheerfully green leaves. It must be this long warm autumn (East Sussex).

Neighbours have rows labelled "Christmas potatoes" but the haulms are already blackened, I suppose by a frost about 3 weeks ago.

Que sera sera.....

[green lily]

My Nicola are sprouting in the garage so I've rescued a couple of dozen and put them to green and chit on a windowsill.That's calmed them down and I expect to get them in around Feb/march depending on weather.
PFAs are just sitting quietly in the same garage waiting for Christmas... ;D

[chriscross1966]

This will seem rather mad....I have some Charlottes sending out little sprouts in their paper sack, so I have put 5 in daylight to toughen up and chit some more.

Soon, on the grounds that volunteer potatoes survive the winter in the soil, I will bury them under a mass of straw and compost and fleece, and hope for the best. At worst I will have five frozen potatoes, at best really early potatoes next year?

All my self saved seed are already on a north-facing windowsill in their egg-boxes.... As I haven't turned the heating on yet it's about as cold a place I have that I can guarantee to be frost-free.... IIRC I've got about 70 assorted selfe-saved in there.... all of them are either heritage or whacky new varieties (mostly TPS)... the only one that breaks that is some tubers from a Pink Fir Apple I had this year that was twice as productive as the other PFA's.... from memory all the PFA seed I planted this year was roughly the same size, but that plant was significantly bigger than the others and the tubers it produced were generally bigger too....

[Buster54]

I put my winter pots(Ulster) in the polytunnel 1st week in July and just like clockwork 1st week in October the tops started dying off same as last year,just gonna leave them and dig up as I need them or before the polytunnel warms up,what size they are I will have to wait and see,did it last year but didn't put them in till 1st week in August(Maris Peer)managed to dig some marbles up for Christmas dinner though although the ground was solid they kept well till end of Feb

[Robert_Brenchley]

Mine have been sitting in a mini-greenhouse turning green; a neighbour of mine swears by storing seed pots in this state. I've just put them in a bucket of sand today, to keep them away from night frost. If it goes really cold I'll have to think of something else.