Monday, September 13, 2010

POTATOES!

I planted German Butterball, an heirloom, Russian Banana also an heirloom, you can see the 4-5" fingers in the box.
There are purple Viking and Yukon Gold in the box also.


TODAY WAS HARVEST DAY
I've been spacing out the collection of food
The garlic before fair
The onions after fair
and now two of the cans of potatoes
that seemed to have the hardest time growing.

The plants had been attacked by something, long ago some of the green could barely grow while they struggled they flowered. I only hoped there would be some potatoes to collect. With two days of dry weather I decided today was the best I could do and I got my tarp out and dumped the two cans. One can did very well with a large harvest but medium size potatoes. The other can did very well also but the only potatoes that got very big were the reds. All the rest are new potato size. Because of the infection I saw on the plants I am putting all plant bits in a plastic bag to go out in the trash. NO COMPOSTING


These potatoes could have trouble being stored because of the attach on the plants so I will have to be sure and eat these 113 yummies in the next two weeks. Not hard to do with their size. The soil, in the 2 trash cans, was wet so the potatoes are still holding onto the mel's mix but after a day or so drying I will brush them all off.
I will make sure they are dry and then bag them in mesh bags.

How about you? What are you harvesting?

Sept 23......OK I've now harvested all 5 cans
The one can on the North part of the yard had the fewest potatoes
The cans I gave the most compost to had the biggest
All and all the cans all did well just smaller
My favorite potato so far is the finger potatoes.

2 comments:

Hildred said...

Oh Fonnell - look what you have been doing since last we talked, - been to Whistler, had another successful Fair season I bet, and here you are harvesting potatoes... And I am not harvesting anything, - just moving things around in the garden.

I followed your advice and got my blogs printed and have been just delighted with them! Thank you.

I will write you and you can answer me about the Fair, please. I miss hearing about it and seeing pictures.

Best to you and Phil and all the family.

Fonnell/Grammie/mom said...

My potatoes have been very tasty this year but small, and yes the reds got big, really big. That would be the purple viking and they are PURPLE! Try roasting the little ones it's very good.