2023 Spuds

I have started chitting my first earlies, they are called Solist. I will only grow them in the poly tunnel in raised beds. I grew them last year and they were a great success, so I ordered 2 x 2kg bags of seed. I will not grow any main crops this year as the last 2-3 years were disasters. They will be sown in March after St. Patrick’s Day and the shoots will be covered with fleece at night when they appear.

I'm trying swift this year, will likely do first plantings toward end of march under tunnel cloche to warm up ground a bit, and protect from frost, then will hopefully plant a few more at 2wk ish intervals to try and spread the harvest

I’ve bought Charlottes again, they’re chitting on their egg trays.

I have some Gemson, chitting away, from a FREE bag of spuds.

I’ll be choosing my spuds on the11th March.
They will be growing in bag so I can move them. But I’ll probably start the bags in the fenced tree area at our new house.

Bought our seed potatoes the other day at the garden centre.

First Early - Red Duke of York
Second Early - Kestrel
Maincrop - Cara (blight resistant)

These have all done well for us in the past. Red Duke of York is one of the best tasting potatoes I've grown. Kestrel is also excellent.

I am determined to get 1kg per 10 L of pot volume for the 1st and 2nd earlies. We've always fallen slightly short, so this year I am putting 3 tubers per 20 L pot instead of 2 to see if that helps.

I decided to take a punt and put a few tubers in today to see how they go, the weathers been cold 4-6’C but should be warmer in the tunnel. I have the majority of the tubers to go in end of March

Last year I had poor results from bought seed tatties and decent results from taties for eating which had sprouted. I will plant one bag of an early variety (yet to decide which?) and the rest will be sprouted supermarket tatties, which is all my Dad ever used.

This year we’re growing 3 seed Maris peer, 3 seed sunset & 6 seed blue annelise in potato bags. 25kg of sarpo Mira anywhere there’s a mound of earth on the new plot ( the big heap that will eventually go into raised beds asa base layer, and all the heaps dug out of trenches). And 1 seed of everything else on the list will also go into potato bags they’ll be in mixed varieties. Because I have no idea which is which.

   

I’ll be back in a minute to ask stupid questions   

This year we’re growing 3 seed Maris peer, 3 seed sunset & 6 seed blue annelise in potato bags. 25kg of sarpo Mira anywhere there’s a mound of earth on the new plot ( the big heap that will eventually go into raised beds asa base layer, and all the heaps dug out of trenches). And 1 seed of everything else on the list will also go into potato bags they’ll be in mixed varieties. Because I have no idea which is which.



I’ll be back in a minute to ask stupid questions   

The problem with asking stupid questions is that invariably you get stupid answers!  Especially from me!