How To Plant Potatoes

 

The scientific name of Potato plant is Solanum tuberosum. Actually Potatoes are relatively inexpensive to procure, however the freshly dug potatoes from your own home garden seem to have a flavor all their own. Potato plants are not grown from seed but from seed potatoes, which sprout underground and grow more tasty tubers. 

There are at least one hundred varieties of seed potatoes that are grown by gardeners in the United States, including some heirloom potatoes. Local growers may even specialize in lesser known varieties that come in different shapes, sizes, and colors. 

On this book you are going to learn about different potato varieties and how to plant seed potatoes so that you can grow your own potatoes.

Potato Plant Info

The botanical name: The botanical name is   Solanum tuberosum.

The common name: The common names are potato, Irish potato.

The plant type: Potato plant is an annual tuberous vegetable.

The size: The size is about one and half to three feet tall with similar spread.

The sun exposure: Potato plants prefer full sun.

The soil type: Potato plant does well in loamy soil.

The soil pH: Acidic (5.0 to 6.0)

USDA Hardiness zones: Potato plants are annual vegetable grown in zones three to ten.

The native area: Potato plants are native to Andes regions of South America.

Toxicity: Potato plant leaves are toxic. 

Potato Varieties

There are more than one hundred varieties of potatoes commonly sold, generally divided into 3 categories:

- The Russets and long white potatoes: This particular one work well for potatoes that will be baked, boiled, or fried.

- The Round white potatoes: This particular one are most commonly used if you like boil potatoes or use them to make potato chips.

- The Red-skinned potatoes: This particular one are frequently used for boiling, baking, mashing, or in potato salads.

Within these categories of potatoes, varieties of potatoes are divided into early, mid-season, and late potatoes. The following are the popular cultivars:

Early-season Varieties

The popular potatoes varieties grown for early-season harvest include:

-         The Irish Cobbler potatoes: The Irish Cobbler has a tannish skin and irregular shape. The Irish Cobbler works well for boiling and mashing.

-         The ‘Norland’ potatoes: The ‘Norland’ potato actually has red skin and is known to be resistant to potato scab.

-         The ‘Mountain Rose’ potato: The ‘Mountain Rose’ potato has red skin and pink flesh; the ‘Mountain Rose’ is known to be resistant to some viruses.

Mid-season Varieties

The popular varieties of potatoes grown for mid-season harvest include:

-         The ‘Red Pontiac’ potatoes: The ‘Red Pontiac’ potato has red skin. The ‘Red Pontiac’ is considered one of the easiest red potatoes to grow.

-         The ‘Viking’ potatoes: The ‘Viking’ is actually a very productive red-skin potato.

-         The ‘Chieftan’ potatoes: The ‘Chieftan’ is actually a red-skin potato that is known to be resistant to potato scab. The ‘Chieftan’ potatoes store well.

-         The 'Yukon Gold' potatoes: The 'Yukon Gold' potato is a very popular thin-skinned potato with yellow flesh. The 'Yukon Gold' potatoes has no eyes.

Late Varieties

The Popular varieties of potatoes grown for late-season harvest include:

- The ‘Katahdin’ potatoes: The ‘Katahdin’ potato actually has tan skin and is resistant to some viruses.

- The ‘Kennebec’ potatoes: The ‘Kennebec’ potato is another tan-skinned potato. The ‘Kennebec’ is bred to be resistant to some viruses as well as late blight.

- The ‘Elba’ potatoes: The ‘Elba’ potato is a tan-skin potato with large round tubers; the ‘Elba’ potato resists blight and potato scab.

If you want to try growing some unique potatoes, look for these:

-         The 'French Fingerling' potatoes: The 'French Fingerling' potato is a long, slender, red-skinned potato that doesn't need peeling. The 'French Fingerling' potatoes are best suited for roasting, baking, and steaming.

-         The 'All Blue' potatoes: The 'All Blue' potato is a medium-sized potato with an unusual blue skin and flesh that keeps well. The 'All Blue' potatoes are suited for sautéing steaming, or mashing.

 

How to Plant Potatoes

Most cold-climate gardeners generally plant potatoes in mid to late spring. In a warm climate, you will do best planting your potatoes in either late summer or late winter, so that the plants will not grow during the hottest months.

Plant the seed potato pieces with the cut-side down (eyes should face up) in a hole or trench that is six inches deep. Leave twelve inches of space around each on all sides. Sprinkle about two tablespoons of a low-nitrogen, high-phosphorous fertilizer between each of the segment. Then cover the potatoes and fertilizer with two inches of soil and then water well.

It is quite easy to grow potatoes successfully if you actually follow some basic guidelines:

- To extend your potato plant growing season, just choose an early variety as well as a late-season variety. You plant these at the same time, but the late-season variety is harvested several weeks after you've already dug the main season potatoes.

- Purchase certified disease-free seed potatoes. Attempting to plant potatoes that you purchased from the grocery store is a gamble. Besides the disease problem, the potatoes are often treated with a growth inhibitor to keep them from sprouting in the grocery store.

- Make sure you don't plant potatoes where tomatoes or eggplant were grown the year before. These vegetables are in the same nightshade family as potatoes and they can easily attract similar pests and problems.

Planting potatoes can actually be done in 1 of 2 ways: a trench-and-hill method that actually involves adding soil around the plant stem as it grows upward, and a simple scatter method.

- Trench method: This is a traditional potato planting method that involves digging a shallow trench about six inches deep and placing the seed potatoes in the trench, eyes facing up. Then cover the potatoes with a couple of inches of soil. As the potato plant grows, the soil is continually hilled up along the sides of the plants. This keeps the soil around the developing tubers loose, and it keeps the surface tubers from being exposed to sunlight, which will turn them green and somewhat toxic. Add soil to the hill whenever the potato plants reach about 4 to 6 inches in height. You can stop hilling up soil when the potato plants begin to flower.

- Scatter method: A lot of gardeners prefer to simply lay the seed potatoes right on the soil and then cover them with a few inches of mulch. You can continue layering mulch as the potato plants grow. If you have a rodent problem, this particular method is probably not your best choice.

Light requirement

To encourage top growth, which will support the growth of the roots, plant the potatoes in full sun. The potato plants can handle part shade, but it's the lush top growth that feeds the tubers underground. The more sun the potato plants get the better, at least 6 to 8 hours per day. The potato plant tubers need to be protected from the sun if they grow near the surface or they will turn green. Hilling soil around the growing potato plants prevents this. Hilling is the process of mounding soil up around the plant stem as it grows.

Soil requirement

Make sure you grow your potatoes in soil with an acidic pH between 5.0 and 6.0. The potatoes that are grown in soils with a higher pH seem to be prone to scab, which produces rough spots on the potato. Potatoes don't particularly like rich soil. If you have a good amount of organic matter in the soil and the pH is neutral to acidic, the potatoes should be happy. The soil for planting actually needs to be a loose and a well-draining soil. If you actually have soil that is heavy in clay, you will need to prepare it with loose soil down to the depth where the potato tubers will grow.

Water requirement

Potato plants actually rely on a steady water supply. Make sure the potato plants receive at least 1 inch of water per week. Potato plants are sensitive to drought conditions, most especially when they flower, as that is the peak time for forming the potato tubers. Mulching around the potato plants can help retain moisture.

Temperature and humidity requirement

The potatoes must not be planted until the soil temperature reaches at least forty-five degrees Fahrenheit, and preferably fifty degrees. Summer crops do best in areas where the summers are cool, as the potato tubers grow best when the soil temperature is sixty to seventy degrees Fahrenheit, and they stop growing when the soil hits eighty degrees Fahrenheit. Mulching around the potato plant such as with a thick layer of straw, can actually keep the soil as much as ten degrees Fahrenheit cooler. The areas with hot summers often plant potatoes as a winter crop. Potatoes don't actually have a preference when it comes to air humidity.

Fertilizer requirement

You can easily fertilize your potatoes with an organic, slow-release fertilizer when you plant them. Every couple of weeks, give the plant a feeding with diluted liquid fertilizer or fish emulsion.

How to propagate Potatoes

The seed potatoes aren't really seeds at all. They are actually full-size potatoes bred for the purpose of growing more potatoes. They start producing shoots from the potato eyes. You've probably seen this happen when you've stored potatoes in the kitchen for too long.

The seed potatoes can actually be planted whole or cut into pieces, with each piece containing an eye or 2 (or 3). Because potatoes can rot if the soil is too cool or wet, a lot of gardeners prefer to allow the cut pieces to callus over by leaving them exposed overnight. You can also buy a powdered fungicide for dusting onto the pieces, to avoid rotting.

How to Harvest Potatoes

The new potatoes are small, immature potatoes. You can harvest a few of these without harm to the plant once the plant reaches about one foot in height, about fifty days after planting. When the potato plant is in flower, the new potatoes are generally ready to harvest. Gently feel around in the soil near the plant and then lift them out.

Expect to wait 2 to 4 months (up to one hundred and twenty days) for the potatoes to reach their full size. The entire crop is ready to harvest once the tops of the plants die off. You can leave the potatoes in the ground for a few weeks longer, if the soil is not wet.

Harvest the potatoes carefully by hand or with a shovel. Turn the soil over and then search through for the round or oval treasures. The tubers can branch out, and digging in with a fork is a sure-fire way of piercing a potato or two. The damaged potatoes are still edible, but they won't keep for long.

How to grow Potatoes in containers

Actually growing potatoes in a container avoids the complications of hilling and takes up less space. You can easily grow potatoes in a tall container such as a clean garbage can, whiskey barrel, a five-gallon pail, or in a planting bag designed for this purpose. Just make sure the container you choose has a good drainage holes in the bottom, and raise up the container a few inches if it is resting on a hard surface so that excess water can easily drain from the container.

The basic process is to actually add 6 inches of fast-draining high-quality potting soil to the bottom of the container and then mix in an organic, slow-release fertilizer Then, spread out your seed potatoes and then cover them with a few inches of soil. Make sure you place the container in a location that receives 6 to 8 hours of sun per day, and then keep the soil moist but not soggy. Make sure you keep adding potting soil to the container as the plants begin to grow.

Make sure you use a diluted liquid fertilizer, every couple of weeks as your potatoes grow. The container-grown potatoes actually need plenty of water, the potato plants that are grown in containers generally require more feeding than the once grown in the ground. 

Pests and disease control

Potato plants also face some pest and disease challenges:

- Aphids and beetles can defoliate the Potato plants. Make sure you monitor them early in the season, before they become a major problem. Check the undersides of the potato plant leaves for the eggs and larvae of common beetle pests like the Colorado potato beetle. You can actually remove these by hand.

- Thin, red wireworms also attack underground. Rotating the location where you plant your potatoes each year will really help to avoid wireworms.

- Scab is actually a common potato disease that looks like raised, corky areas on the skin or sunken holes on the surface. Lowering the soil pH will really help to control scab. You can add peat moss to the planting area. 

- Late blight (the cause of the Irish potato famine) actually turns the foliage black, then moldy. Burn or dispose of the foliage. Don’t compost it. The potatoes can still be harvested, but you must wait several weeks. To avoid this problem you can use certified disease-resistant seed potatoes.