Page 12 - Simply Vegetables Spring 2021

2021 Potato Growing
RON NUTALL
These are notes on my recent potato conversations neatly summarised on growing potatoes in 2021 with the aim of growing some quality specimens to exhibit and win some prizes.
Spring work on the potato plot 2021
Are you now planning to produce a plate of the very best exhibition potatoes that you have ever grown? After looking at this year’s seed catalogues and spoken with your friends, I am sure that you will have decided on the varieties to cultivate this year. (This can be important as some varieties are far better for exhibiting than others. Ed)
Are you now anxiously awaiting for the promised delivery of your order? Expect it to arrive on or about the first week of March, in plenty of time to prepare the seed potatoes to produce the high quality exhibits to which you aspire for the autumn shows
Prepare your new sets by washing them
in some baby sterilizing fluid, [30 mls. to 5 litres of water will be strong enough]. Let them soak for 30 minutes. Hopefully this will prevent all residual diseases on the skins and kill any of the dreaded scab. Remove and dry them thoroughly before placing them in a safe place, where they will be warm in their egg carton tray, waiting for that day in a months’ time when, well sprouted, they will ready for planting.
Working the soil will be the next important job at any opportunity as the ground slowly dries out in the spring. Feed your trenches with a general high potash potato fertilizer along the bottom of the rows, a handful, approx. 85 to 113gms [3–4ozs] for every metre / yard, and a few pellets to discourage damage from hungry slugs during the summer.
Now produce as fine a tilth as you can. Mix the fertilizer and soil well in the bottom of the trench. This strategy is to make it easier for the roots to fully explore the soil below when they require food and moisture whilst growing.
The potato mixture. Everybody has their own ‘secret potato mixture’. Basically they all mostly contain moss peat (coir or similar will do if you want to avoid using peat) and include a slow release fertilizer in sufficient quantities to last the summer. This should be enough if it is supplemented with some liquid fertilizer sprayed onto the foliage every two weeks.
Planting out the potato bags. Plant the bags out by the end of the first week of May as they need 14 to 16 weeks to grow to exhibition size. Space 60cm (2 feet) between the rows and 20cm (8 inches) deep, with
a hands-width between the bags for easy access. Remember to have your fleece ready for protection from a late frost and take precautions to prevent the tops from flopping about in the breeze whilst they are growing.
Changes for me this year:
My choices for this year...
It was a sad decision to drop
the variety Nadine, it has always served me well with its reliability. Unfortunately a show entry of Nadine has to be so much better than a plate of Winston to be the winner. Once again I have stayed with Kestrel as my choice of coloured variety. Although I find that it is losing its eye-colour, it is still a magnificent variety for me to grow. Finally after previous disasters with Amour, I feel that it deserves one more chance to redeem itself!
2020 Kestrel
2020 Winston
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Extend my potato growing season by planting the bags under cover during the second week of April.
My peat will be broken up much finer. It will be easier to keep the compost damp and prevent it drying out. The spuds will have better skins, and insects will be despondent at making home in what could be considered to be ant-heaven, in a dry summer. There will be much bigger holes in the bottom of my bags to encourage the roots to extend their hunt for nutrients in the soil below, freeing much needed growing space in the containers.
I am advised that Iodine helps give the eyes of tubers their red/blue colour. Apparently it is safe to apply this element by adding 113gms (4oz.) of calcified seaweed to each 20 litre bag of growing mixture. Unfortunately Last year my Kestrel potatoes were harvested with the minimum of colour. Was this due to a change in the breeding of the variety I grew? (this
is unlikely as it is propagated from tubers and not bred every year like a
F1 hybrid – Ed) Or, did I feed them with an insufficient quantity of the Seaweed mixture? This year the amounts in my mix will be increased. Watch this space for any resulting observations.
Finally, I will grind my fertilizer into the finest dust for my bags with a view to avoiding any contact with granules to the delicate skins of my developing tubers. I think that this interaction has been the cause of pin-head sized black spots which have been difficult to clean. I will give a try anyway. (If you grind the slow release fertiliser it will no longer be slow release as it is the outer coating of the fertiliser granules that makes it slow release – Ed)
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12 Simply Vegetables