Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[Harvey Ussery <huboxwood@earthlink.net>]

> It is very difficult to store white potatoes in SC.  Instead, I
> am trying to grow them over a longer season.  I'll let you know if anything
> works!
>
> Dianne

Diane,

I've had good luck growing potatoes as a second crop here in northern VA 
(Zone 6b). I plant my spring potatoes around now (folks in these parts 
aim for Mar 17, St Pat's Day), and set aside the remainder of my seed 
potatoes to plant in early July. I find that the second planting tends 
not to have the same challenges from Colorado potato beetle as the 
earlier planting. Because the summer is drier, the yield of the second 
crop is usually not as good, but the quality is fine (and the quantity 
is enough to be worth the effort). My only major disappointment has to 
do with Caribe, one of my favorite varieties, from which I've always had 
zero sprouting in the summer planting. That's after three tries. I no 
longer plant it in the summer planting.

I've also grown an early crop of potatoes in the late winter, early 
spring greenhouse, using stored pot's from the basement as seed. Spuds 
usually rather small, but great for boiling potatoes much earlier than 
we'd get them from the garden.

~Harvey
--
Harvey in northern VA
www.themodernhomestead.us

"Just a single fill of ethanol for a four-wheel drive SUV uses
enough grain to feed one person for an entire year."  ~Lester Brown