Potatoe Blossoms	Mike's Garden Blog Questions, Answers, Musings about gardening. Help support my site. My designs or make your own.
Organic Cotton Tee made in USA $18.99 Home 2007 Archive Posts Stumble It! Save This Page	Three Kinds of Potatoes in the Garden This Year August 14, 2008 17:26:27 Purple potatoes, white fingerlings, and regular red potatoes are what I planted this year in my garden. All three were disappointments. I thought with all the moisture and cool weather we had early it would favor the potatoes and we would have a big crop. During the year previous I had applied to this ground some well rotted horse manure and the contents of the compost pile. I do not think fertility was an issue. In the following picture the red potatoe is about as big as a tennis ball. The purple and the fingerling in the picture are about the biggest ones of their group. Last year I had potatoes that were too big to bake, or, at least they would have taken 2 hours to bake they were so big. I bought my seed for this years crop in two places. The purple and the fingerlings came from Whole Foods. They were not organically grown potatoes or anything and my red seed stock was purchased at the local nursery where I usually buy them. The rows were mulched at planting time with paper and straw. The green above ground part of the crops seemed to look about normal size but when I got to digging them there just was not much there. The purple potatoes are really hard to find because they are covered with dirt and dark in color when damp. The little fingerling are mostly just that, little. There were potatoes there about the size of the end of my little finger. Very few were as big as the one in the picture. Once I had them all dug I left them out in a big tub a couple of days and then rubbed the dirt off of them. Then I put them in boxes and store them in the corner of the kitchen. Last year we finished them off about Christmas time. I do not think these will last that long. We do eat potatoes all the time. When I was a kid we had potatoes at every meal. We might eat them once a week or so or maybe twice. Baked is probably the favorite around here. Steamed is often times served also. Also, when I was a kid a Czech woman down the road from us used to cook potatoes, cabbage, carrots, and green beans all together in one pot. I have done that on occasion. Well we will see what next years brings in the way of potatoes. Comment on this article