Sunday On The Allotment - 10 Mar - Potato Planting

Despite a freezing cold morning in West Cornwall - I was determined to get out to my plot today - after an absence of two weeks.

After a lovely sunny day yesterday Winter has bitten back - with some force.

Spring is approaching - and I wanted to get my first couple of rows of seed potatoes into the ground.


As mentioned in my previous post - Potato Preparation - I manured the potato plots last year and cleared the ground ready for planting a couple of weeks ago. The soil is looking really good - and hopefully fertile ! ......

My seed spuds have been chitting in the garden shed since delivery from Marshall's Seeds in January. This process helps them to get off to a good start in the ground by growing shoots.

I must admit - they haven't chitted very well this year  just a few very small shoots. It may have been too cold out there - I might chit them indoors next year.



I chose two "early" varieties - Charlotte and Wilja. Both are great to eat with a creamy waxy flesh.

Planting was pretty straightforward - I'd already done most of the hard work by preparing the ground.

I simply dug a trench - about 6 inches deep.

I won't be adding any more manure - as potatoes don't like this.

 I then dug out a hole for each seed potato and popped it in - with the sprouts uppermost.

To finish I back filled with soil - leaving some left for earthing up later.

All that's left to do is to add some slug pellets and wait for the first green growth to appear.

Then I'll start earthing up - once the green shoots are about 4 inches high - and start looking forward to eating some lovely fresh new potatoes in May.