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Potatoes

jennyhiggins37jennyhiggins37 Posts: 24
in Fruit & veg
Hi hope everyone had a great Christmas and New Year. Anyway I bought and planted some Charlotte potatoes about October maybe November but nothing has happened no plants or any hint anything is happening. So decided maybe it's not worked and was going to dig them up and use it as a learning experience. Went to dig up the potatoes I had planted only to find lots of very tiny I think potatoes. I have no clue what's gone on. These potatoes were just in the earth not attached to anything. Any advice please, first time growing potatoes
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  • FairygirlFairygirl Posts: 52,097
    I don't grow them, but I'd have thought October was far too late for planting them. I think you can plant in late summer if you want them for Christmas etc, but most people would plant earlier than that on average, so that they have them through summer, as they're more of a salad potato for boiling and eating whole, rather than for mash or roasting etc.

    Someone who grows potatoes should be able to help you though  :)
    It's a place where beautiful isn't enough of a word....



    I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
  • fidgetbonesfidgetbones Posts: 16,695
    Normally for xmas potatoes, you plant the tubers in large buckets initially outside so that the tops grow well, then take them in a greenhouse before the first frosts to keep them going.  They look like you have just dug up the seed potatoes. Did you get any top growth at all? Where did you plant them?

  • jennyhiggins37jennyhiggins37 Posts: 24
    fidgetbones hi. Just relooked at when planted them and it was September. I had them in potatoe growing bags. I got no top growth at all. The potatoes in the bag when I bought it were much bigger than what I'm finding in the soil. All a learning curve 
  • DovefromaboveDovefromabove Posts: 83,864
    edited January 2022
    Whereabouts have you been growing them?

    Any sign of rats in your garden ... rats will take any amount of potatoes in the winter. that might be where the ones you planted have disappeared to.  

    Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.





  • Joyce GoldenlilyJoyce Goldenlily Posts: 2,318
    The chances are your original seed potatoes began producing new potatoes but the weather was no good for them this autumn. You have found what would have been your crop of new potatoes that have not been able to mature and grow to full size. I have had the same results this year. A handful of potato peas. The seed potatoes you planted will have rotted off.
    Christmas potatoes rarely crop as heavily as Spring planted seed potatoes but are a tasty treat at Christmas. I planted my seed in containers and barrels but it didn't help. You just have to try each year, with a mild autumn into winter, one day you will be able to enjoy new potatoes with your turkey.
  • DovefromaboveDovefromabove Posts: 83,864
    edited January 2022
    I really don't see how the seed potatoes could have produced any new potatoes without making any top growth ... potatoes grow from the stems of the potato plant. 

    Are you sure there wasn't any top growth at all?  Could you have missed seeing it ?...  If they were outside it would have rotted away after the frosts started of course. 

    Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.





  • jennyhiggins37jennyhiggins37 Posts: 24
    Dovefromabove said:
    Whereabouts have you been growing them?

    Any sign of rats in your garden ... rats will take any amount of potatoes in the winter. that might be where the ones you planted have disappeared to.  
    Hi been growing them outside in potatoe bags. No sign of rats but do have squirrels but put netting over them and they did not seem to bother. 
  • jennyhiggins37jennyhiggins37 Posts: 24
    Dovefromabove said:
    I really don't see how the seed potatoes could have produced any new potatoes without making any top growth ... potatoes grow from the stems of the potato plant. 

    Are you sure there wasn't any top growth at all?  Could you have missed seeing it ?...  If they were outside it would have rotted away after the frosts started of course. 
    Nothing seen on top unless the local wildlife got to it before I saw any even through the netting. It's all learning. 
  • SkandiSkandi Posts: 1,674
    I've left a sack of potatoes in the barn for an entire year before (forgotten about) and it grew in total darkness and produced small potatoes like those in the picture, potatoes will grow new potatoes with just the energy in the mother tuber. of course they are small and pathetic, but it does happen.
    I suspect the OP's potatoes did grow top growth but something ate it before they noticed the greens and then the tubers produced those small things as a final fling.
  • Penny_ForthemPenny_Forthem Posts: 306
    On 10 Aug, I sowed a potato sack of Pentland Javelin and one of Nicola. They romped away outside, then we brought them into the greenhouse October.
    Top growth died away but, because of hub's health issues, I haven't even checked them.
    Probably, when the better weather comes and I water them, they'll restart, so I'll leave them dormant for now.
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