If you grow potatoes in the garden, you will of course be interested to know what you should pay special attention to when caring for them. How often should you water the plants, do they need special fertilizer and are there other important things you should pay attention to? Today we have put together some helpful tips for you on how to plant and care for potatoes. Especially if you are a beginner when it comes to vegetable gardening, you can use it as a guide.
General information about potato care
Summer offers ideal conditions for theFormation of fungal diseases, which unfortunately can also affect our carefully tended vegetable plants. One of these diseases to which potatoes are particularly susceptible is late blight. It begins to develop on the leaves, then spreads to the stems and in the final stage even attacks the potato tubers underground. The only preventative measure you can take is to plant the potato plants early (as early as the beginning of March). For this purpose, you should also choose potato varieties that ripen early. Then you can harvest them in good time, before illness can occur.
What else is important when growing potatoes in the garden?
Have you heard about piling up potato plants?
As the term suggests, in this step the soil in which the potato plants are grown is collected into a pile. This has a specific and very beneficial purpose: as soon as the bare stem is surrounded by soil, new root systems will form in these places, which will also bear tubers. The harvest is therefore richer. Repeat this step a few times as the growth phase progresses. Find out exactly how to do thisin this article.
Fertilize without being stingy
You can hardly use too much fertilizer if you want to grow potatoes in the garden. Ideally, you should supply the soil in the fall of the previous yearCompost and manure, after you have dug up the ground. This means that all important nutrients can get into the soil until planting time and provide the young plants with good supplies right from the start. Continue to fertilize regularly throughout the growth phase, where you can use manure again, horn shavings or even organic tomato fertilizer. Whatever you choose, simply apply it directly to the soil surface around the plant.
Grow potatoes in the garden and water them properly
- How often?In contrast to cucumbers and tomatoes, potato plants require significantly less water, so they are also extremely easy to care for. Nevertheless, you should avoid long dry periods and care for the plants, with one watering per week being sufficient. This guarantees you large potato tubers when you grow potatoes in the garden.
- Which water?Here too the plant is very tolerant.Both rainwateras well as normal tap water is suitable as it tolerates limescale well.
- How do you water correctly?Wet leaves and stems should be avoided at all costs, as this can promote the formation of fungi and potato plants are already quite susceptible to this, as we have already mentioned. For this reason, when watering, be careful to only water the base area of the main stem. You can control the water jet better if you use a watering stick.
The potato plants for typical pests check
Everyone has, if not seen the Colorado potato beetle, then at least heard of it. It is the terror of anyone who wants to grow potatoes in the garden and, in principle, cannot be avoided. However, the damage will be limited if you check your plants regularly and react immediately.as soon as you see a beetle– by simply disposing of it.
Then also examine the undersides of the leaves, because this is where the pests lay their eggs (they are yellow in color). It may now be the case that some larvae have already hatched. You can recognize these voracious pests by their red-black color. Remove them, as well as the beetles, immediately.
Tipp: Cold makes these pests less active. Therefore, morning is the ideal time for bug cleaning. When collecting, be careful not to drop any beetles that will later make themselves at home on your plants. They have the ability to freeze when they feel threatened (you may know this from ladybugs), which means you can easily lose them. You can prevent this by placing a container under the beetle before attempting to pull it off.
Grow potatoes in the garden and store them properly after harvesting
Of course, the best part of growing potatoes in the garden is harvesting the tubers. When can you harvest potatoes? Once the plants turn yellow and begin to die, the potato tubers are ready to harvest. This usually takes around 3 months. Now you havethanks to your good carea rich harvest and of course we want to have some of these tubers for a long time to come. You're in luck because they store well and if you do it right, they last quite a long time.
First, sort out all damaged and rotten tubers, as these could infect the healthy ones. A temperature of 4 to 6 degrees is ideal for storing potatoes, and the place should also be dark to avoid themgerminate early. Check the tubers regularly and remove any that have started to rot in the meantime.
