My husband brought home a nice bag of fingerling potatoes from our local warehouse store yesterday. A mix of La Ratte, Russian Banana, French and Rose Finn (though I don't know which are which). Since these were varieties I was planning to mail order as seed potatoes, I immediately pulled out a bunch. I'll save these for planting instead of ordering and paying for shipping costs. Last year I had very good luck with planting supermarket potatoes. Why not?
I also noticed I had a Yukon Gold that was beginning to sprout, so I added this to the collection that I put in a bag with airflow and hung in a cold dark area of the basement. I'll look for a few more varieties to add to my collection in the next few months. (Potato planting time is April 10-15.) I'm looking forward to a nice potato patch this year in my new community garden plot.
Solanum tuberosum
6 comments:
I've been just dying to find some fingerling potatoes (not easy in a small town) ever since I saw this recipe for blistered potatoes on EAT - listen to your mother. Made my mouth water, just looking a the picture.
Kathy
Yes, you can take cuttings when large baking potatoes start to sprout in your kitchen. Wait till they are a little longer and cut a little cone of flesh from under them. Pot them up and you should have some small starter plants!
Thanks for the potato ideas.
There are some advantages to getting real 'seed potatoes', the main one is viruses. Potato viruses are very common, stay in the ground of your garden and are carried one year to the next in seed potatoes.
Seed potatoes are usually certified virus free, so you avoid introducing viruses into your garden.
If you plan to buy new potatoes or seed potatoes every year and not try to overwinter any, it probably doesn't matter if your garden has potato viruses. They really only become a problem if you are trying to save and regrow your own varieties.
Because you are going to get a community garden, it may already have viruses in it anyway.
I had the best roasted fingerling potatoes at a local restaraunt tonight (Savinos). I'll try to cook this bag as well as those some day soon.
Just the article I was looking for. My community garden plot is only 10 ft X 10 ft and I may not be able to use the seed potatoes which are available in large quantities. So this year I will plant supermarket potatoes. Thanks.
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