Harvested potatoes too early - can I salvage?

Food, Nutrition and Agriculture
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Zunzuncito
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Joined: Sun Jul 10, 2016 6:07 pm

Harvested potatoes too early - can I salvage?

Post by Zunzuncito »

Hi Folks,

I know we have some super gardeners on here and I'm after a little bit of advice. I over estimated how ready my potatoes were and have harvested them and very annoyingly other than 3 ok sized ones all the others were really small. I had waited for the foliage to die back and go yellow so thought they were good to harvest but obviously not (this is my first year growing them so I'm a newbie).

My question really is can I salvage anything with this tiny small potatoes? Can I replant now or re-use next season?

Any advice would be much appreciated :-)
jansman
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Re: Harvested potatoes too early - can I salvage?

Post by jansman »

No. The crop you lifted is the crop you have. The drought has affected commercial crops, so don’t feel bad. Buy new seed for next year, get plenty of compost / manure in the ground, and irrigate well. That’s spuds.
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grenfell
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Joined: Thu Jul 04, 2013 7:55 pm

Re: Harvested potatoes too early - can I salvage?

Post by grenfell »

Even in good years there are always some smaller potatoes. With these "marbles" as we call them ( basically anything an inch and under ) we wash them and bake them in a tray with onions , peppers , garlic and oil so nothing goes to waste.
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xplosiv1
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Location: Scotland

Re: Harvested potatoes too early - can I salvage?

Post by xplosiv1 »

yeah, not much you can do. the drought really affect everyone's potato crop this year from what I've dug up already I'd say i'm looking at a 30%-40% reduction on total weight from last year. .... it happens, thats why I always plant extra where I can.
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Zunzuncito
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Joined: Sun Jul 10, 2016 6:07 pm

Re: Harvested potatoes too early - can I salvage?

Post by Zunzuncito »

Thanks all, that's what I thought - never mind, I'll live and learn for next year.

Thanks for the tip grenfell I'll give your tray bake a try so they don't go to waste.