Potatoe Storage

[k15n1]

I've come into a 1/3 of 2 30-ft rows of potatoes. The people I'm gardening with are in some big @$#%^ hurry, and want to dig out the potatoes now. That's early, even for southern MN. Anyway, how am I going to store these potatoes? All of the root-cellar techniques mention that they should be harvested when the plants die off. Should I do anything different for an early harvest?

 

[Marianne]

I don't think you'd need to do anything different. You'll just end up with smaller spuds. Spread 'em out on newspaper so they can dry a bit and I bet you'll be fine. JMO

Lacking a cold room, I partially cook and freeze most of mine.

 

[Pirtykitty]

We dug ours after the plants died down.. this past June... I placed them in a big plastic tray and let them air dry ing the garage.. Then brought them in the house... I picked about 20 to hopefully replant in Sept... Keep them in cool dark place... we don't have basement so I keep in pantry.

 

[k15n1]

OK. Thanks.

There are some big potatoes, but a bunch of little ones on each plant... Those will get bigger as the season goes on, right?

 

[Marianne]

Some of them will. But I always have plenty of little bitty ones when I harvest them. Last year I just threw the dinky ones back in the hole while digging them. This year I bet I had 15 volunteer potato plants from those. Unfortunately, the current potato patch was in a different area of the garden so the volunteer potatoes are in with the green beans and beets.

Okay, I'm kind of confused here. I thought they wanted you to dig them now. Did you talk them into leaving them for a while yet?