New potatoes
 

This will be my first year growing potatoes. I purchased a bag of early season Red Norland potatoes. I won't be able to plant them for another 3 weeks because I can't get into the community garden until then.

I noticed they are sprouting in the bag. Should I leave them in the bag or should I take them out and spread them out somewhere? I know that I cut them up and dry them out 3 or 4 days before planting, but another book said that I could plant them whole.

Help!

LoreD

if the potatoes are about 2 inches or smaller, they can be planted whole. Larger potatoes get cut into 2 inch pieces with 2 sprouts on each piece. The cut tubers should be allowed to heal for a day. All your seed potatoes should be tossed with agricultural wettable sulfur before planting sprout-side up. I would recommend planting the pieces 1' apart in rows 2' apart [B]in well amended soil[/B]. Make sure you dig a good 6"-8" trench to plant them in so you can hill them later on without the hills being so high.

Potatoes will sprout slowest in a cool, dark place and fastest in a warm, light place.

Feldon's spacing works in highly amended soil such as in raised beds. If planting into garden soil, they need more room. I plant mine about 10 inches apart in the row and 3 feet apart between the rows.

Some potato varieties are more rampant than others. Kennebec for example is known for huge vines 4 to 5 feet long.

Pre-sprouting potatoes is known as chitting. If you bought seed potatoes, they should already have been treated to a temperature regime that induces early sprouting.

I have 250+ hills of potatoes planted and am looking forward to the first mature spuds.

Fusion

I'm growing Kennebec and some kind of yellow that after the guy said the name 3 times I still didn't get it. The Kennebec are definitely growing faster.