Allotments 4 All

I dug up one Kesterel plant earlier and had 2.160 KG.  I'm really pleased.  A few of them had scab but that's only cosmetic...

Here is a picture.

Hiya can I ask when you planted them? Ive got kestral in but was going to leave them until July but may have got mine in abit late

Hi Crystalmoon

I planted them on the 8th March.  We like to get them in early due to blight down here in Cornwall.  We always get hit...

We have a good 15 plants or so.  I'm hoping for another bumper crop.

Ah that explains it then,lol I thought I had maybe put mine in way too late as Ive never grown Kestral before. Hope you have a bumper crop thats blight free

My Kestrels are ready and I put mine mid March.  ;D Those look great smudger!

Crystalmoon I'm growing these as well but won't be starting to lift them for around another month as I didn't plant them out until late March.
Being second earlies they really need to be in the ground for about 120 days. They're an excellent potato and one of my favourites.  :)

Thanks Flighty, reckon i will leave mine in til July, possibly even end of July as i put them in April ish i think stupidly didnt write it down for the first time in 4 years! It was so dry here in Kent too they didnt really get going til late May

Up here in sunny (not) Manchester we are lucky to be digging up our first earlies. My Aaron Pilot are really nice thanks to the rain,but second earlies are a while away yet. Nice result though,Smudger  :) :)

I've started digging mine too, I've also got kestrel and accord. I couldn't remember which were which, but thanks to your picture I now know! Thanks!  :)

our smile second earlies are huge  ;D

My Kestrel will have to wait a few weeks as they didnt go in until 29 March. 

This is the 3rd year we have grown Kesterel as a 2nd.  I also have some spare tubers in the fridge and I will be throwing these into a spare container and placing them in the poly tunnel to see if I can get some Xmas spuds....

I probably would not change the 2nds now...

We are growing Cara for our mains.  This is only due to their blight resistance.

We had a bumper crop from them last year (of which the mice ate a quarter) so we have put a second row in this year..

This is my first year of having an allotment, so I'm making lot's of mistakes and learning along the way.  Mistake number one was not to write down when I planted everything. 

Can you tell when potatoes are ready to dig up by looking at the plants or is it a case of just digging them up and seeing what they look like?

Quote from: Davidberry on June 19, 2011, 17:10:29
This is my first year of having an allotment, so I'm making lot's of mistakes and learning along the way.  Mistake number one was not to write down when I planted everything. 

Can you tell when potatoes are ready to dig up by looking at the plants or is it a case of just digging them up and seeing what they look like?

Hello Davidberry, 1st earlies should be ready between now and the end of June for us northerners. A good sign that 'earlies' are ready is once the flowers have dropped of the potato haulm. If they are in flower,leave them a while longer and if the flower buds have not even opened yet,leave them alone as they are likely to be lates.

Thanks for that!  I could swear that the ones with the flowers on weren't the earlies and the ones without flowers were the earlies, I'll wait and see for another week or two!

Hi, davidberry,it was discussed on here, some earlies don't flower, have a firkle in the soil underneath the spuds, we've been eating our earlies for 5 weeks now and some of them are baking size  :o :)

Just goesd to show how the conditions all over the country differed in March 2011.
On 8th March here, it was bitter cold with waterlogged soil and hard frosts at night.
St Patricks Day (when our spuds mostly go in) 17th March, was again waterlogged and very cold.
The first lot of spuds went in on Sunday 27th Mar, emerged about 4 weeks later and promptly got blasted by frost around end Apr. An elderly relative staying, told everyone they'd succumbed to the drought (was dry here for 10 weeks from 3rd Apil). TGhyre lookingf good now, will have a dig soon to see.

for Pigeonseed Accord is first early. Kestrel second early.
  planted my Kestrel on 26 March, two rows each of 16 tubers,first row 21.36 kg, second row 19.54 kg, most of them are large ( biggest .42 kg) very few under hens egg size. one row dug Friday second row dug today. The reason, we had a blight warning for last Thursday and I'm not taking any chances

My Kestrel are still growing strongly and started to flower last week but I've not had a look to see how they're getting on yet.