A good spud, nothing quite beats it, a staple food appearing on dinner plates across the land! We can’t wait to grow potatoes this year! Luckily they are in the Grow Club this month! But how do you get them started?!
We have put together this guide to help you to grow your own potatoes!
What is Chitting I hear you say!? First of all, once you have bought your seed potatoes (it’s best to buy them so you know what you are growing and that they are disease-free) you can start chitting them on your window sills. Chitting is the process of getting your seed potatoes to sprout before planting them. While it is not absolutely necessary to grow your potatoes, it does help them develop quicker once planted, it will speed up the sprouting process by giving them plenty of light and warmth resulting in an earlier and slightly better harvest.
1) To start chitting your potatoes, we recommend putting them into egg boxes with the rose end facing upwards.
Place the egg box onto a windowsill indoors where they will get plenty of light and also are kept warm and dry.
2) Wait till the potatoes start to grow green shoots while hopefully the weather gets warmer and the frosts come to an end. After this, you will be able to start planting the potatoes.
3) Now we can plant the potatoes! Spread 15cm of potting compost to the bottom of a container. Evenly space 3 or 4 (max) seed potatoes with their green shoots facing upwards. After this, cover the seed potatoes with another 15cm layer of compost.
4) When the foliage shows through the compost, allow it to grow to around 20cm high, then cover with another 15cm of compost leaving 5cm showing. (Repeat until the container is full.)
5) Potatoes in bags and containers require plenty of water particularly during dry weather so make sure to keep the soil moist and water regularly. You can add a general liquid feed once a week to boost production.
Time to harvest
From June you can begin to harvest your tasty potatoes. A good way to see that your potatoes are ready to harvest is to look out for signs from the foliage. For the early crops, wait until flowers grow and then drop off before harvesting. For main crops, wait until the foliage starts to yellow. Once this happens, cut the foliage back and wait a few more days before harvesting.
Seed Potatoes planted during March/April.
- 1st early crops take 10-14 weeks – harvest from June onwards.
- 2nd early crops take 14-16 weeks – harvest from late June onwards.
- Main crop take 16-22 weeks – harvest from July to October.
- Salads potatoes treat as 2nd early types.
We have a range of quality seed potatoes at Seed Pantry, so come check them out and get some spuds growing at your home too!
Enjoy 🙂
Seed Pantry Team
