Knowing when to harvest homegrown potatoes and how to handle them after harvest helps gardeners end up with the maximum amount of potatoes possible to store for those cold winter months. Potatoes are definitely one of America’s favorite vegetables. Did you know that each year we eat about 125 pounds of potatoes per person? Potatoes are a staple food and many home gardeners plant potatoes to store them for the fall and winter months. Knowing how to take care of your homegrown potatoes is important so that they store well.
Toughen up potatoes for storage before harvest by not watering them much after they flower. Let the potato plants and the weather tell you when to harvest them. Wait until the tops of the vines have completely died before you begin harvesting. When the vines are dead, it is a sure sign the potatoes have finished growing and are ready to be harvested.
Potatoes are tubers, and you want your plant to store as much of that flavorful starch as possible.
Dig up a test hill to see how mature the potatoes are. The skins of mature potatoes are thick and firmly attached to the flesh. If the skins are thin and rub off easily, your potatoes are still too new and should be left in the ground for a few more days. Don’t leave the potatoes that you have dug in the sun for long after they have been dug up from your garden, otherwise your potatoes may turn green, Green potatoes have a bitter taste and if enough is eaten can cause vomiting and diarrhea. Small spots can be trimmed off, but if there is significant greening, throw the potato out. Potatoes can tolerate light frost, but when the first hard frost is expected, it’s time to get out the shovels and start digging potatoes. An interesting place you might not be aware of is the potato museum in Washington, D.C. that contains lots of history, information and artifacts relating to potatoes including antique harvesting tools. As you dig, be careful not to scrape, bruise or cut the potatoes. Damaged potatoes will rot during storage and should be used as soon as possible. After harvesting, potatoes must be cured. Let them sit in temperatures of 45 to 60 degrees Fahrenheit for about two weeks. This will give the skins time to harden and minor injuries to seal. After the potatoes have been dug, brush the soil off. Do not wash potatoes until you’re ready to use them. Washing can easily reduce the storage life and encourage mold. Store potatoes in a cool, dark area after harvesting. Too much light will turn them green.
Sometimes before harvesting some potatoes become exposed to the sun because they are just barely underground and not covered with soil. Keep soil over the potatoes to prevent sunlight from turning them green. If you want new potatoes, which are small, immature potatoes about 1 to 2 inches in size, harvest them just before their vines die.
What do potato plants look like when they’re ready to harvest?
How do you know when it’s time to harvest potatoes? – The great thing about potatoes is that once the tubers have started to set, you are welcome to dig them up anytime to grab potatoes. Depending on the size of potatoes you are after, here are two landmarks to look for:
For new (baby) potatoes: Once the majority of your potato plants have started to flower, that’s a great time to start harvest new or baby potatoes. These creamy, tender early potatoes are a springtime treat that isn’t to be missed. For full-size potatoes: It’s easy to know when main crop potatoes are ready because all the leaves on your potato plants will be yellow or brown, and the plants will start to fall over. This means the plant has put all of its energy into the tubers, and it’s time to dig! If you see spots or other disease symptoms on the foliage or if die-off is only on some of your plants—this might not be the natural end of the plant’s life-cycle, and you should check for potato diseases.
What month do you harvest potatoes?
Two Main Types of Potatoes – The time it takes potato plants to produce a crop is dependent on whether the potato is an early potato variety or a maincrop (storage) variety. Early potatoes need much less time from planting to harvest and grow good crops of thin-skinned new potatoes.
- You tend to harvest early potatoes in late spring to early summer since they take around eight to fourteen weeks (55-100 days) to harvest.
- Maincrop varieties take much longer, often around five months.
- Within the early category, you have potatoes that grow faster than others.
- The quickest is ‘first early’ potatoes, which can give you a harvest of new potatoes eight to twelve weeks after planting, depending on the variety.
‘Second early’ potatoes generally take fourteen to sixteen weeks to mature, which is excellent because it staggers the harvest if you plant both first and second earlies in your garden. You can plant them at the same time or wait a couple of weeks to stagger the harvests more. Potato flowers beginning to drop are a good sign that it’s time to harvest potatoes
How often should you water potatoes?
Generally, potatoes need between 1-2 inches of water per week ; this could be provided by rain events or you to make up the difference.
What happens when potatoes flower?
Do Potato Plants Bloom? – Potato plants produce flowers during the end of their growing season. These turn into the true fruit of the plant, which resemble small, green tomatoes. Potato plant flowering is a normal occurrence, but the flowers usually just dry up and fall off rather than producing fruit.