Lache Pas La Patate

That phrase translated from Cajun French to English means, "Don't drop the potato!"  That phrase also means "Don't give up!" or "Hang in There!"  We won't be dropping any potatoes - at least not today.  Our phone rang right before 5pm and the caller id said, "Parsley's Feed."  I knew immediately what they were calling about.  Mrs. Johnette confirmed it when she said, "Your seed potatoes are in."  I told her I'd be over directly to pick them up.  A couple of weeks back I had put our names on an order list at our local feed store for 10 pounds of LaSoda seed potatoes.  Today they came in and we hopped in the car and drove over to get them.   

At the feed store, they had a notebook with several pages of names and numbers and how many pounds of seed potatoes the customer wanted.  As customers were called today, people were driving up to pick up their potatoes before closing time at 5pm.  A gentleman from our church that just turned 90 years old had ordered 50 pounds of seed potatoes!  (You read that right)  I hope in 31 years when I'm 90 I'm still planting potatoes!

I always have the same exact thought every year when I open the box and look at the potatoes:  "Should we just eat them?"  It's going to get chilly tonight and a potato soup with bacon, green onions and fresh parsley would hit the spot.  What if the yield on our potato crop is such that we harvest less than we plant?  That's always a possibility, but hope springs eternal.  We'll get these in the ground.

But something has to be done first.  We cut the potatoes and let them scab over.  You see the potato has a number of eyes.  From out of these eyes, a plant will grow.  Hopefully, each potato plant will grow numerous potatoes.  I use a knife to cut each potato in half, being careful (not to drop it!), but also not to cut through an eye.

When I finished the task, I had an entire tray of cut up seed potatoes.  I'll put the tray in a warm room and let the cuts scab over for about a week and then I'll put them in the ground in 10 days or so.

I Only Have Eyes For You

I was struggling on the title of today's post, but remembered that cool song by the Flamingos, "I only have eyes for you."  That has to be it, I thought.  A friend from church sent us a funny text that said, "Don't tell secrets in the garden.  The Potatoes have eyes, the corn has ears, and the beanstalk!"

We try to plant our potatoes around Valentine's Day each year.  That means you have to get busy beforehand.  I asked Tricia to go by the feed store and pick up 8 pounds of seed potatoes.  We like the LaSoda variety as it seems to do well in our growing zone.  Well, Tricia forgot.  When she went the next day, the feed store was already out!  The early bird gets the worm.  They were out the next week, too.  Finally, another shipment came in and Tricia came home with 8 pounds.  Now, you have a choice here.  These potatoes would be great boiled and buttered and topped with fresh parsley.  Why, I'd eat the whole pot.  But, delayed gratification is where it's at.  Patience is a virtue.

Later this spring, we'll weigh our harvest and will be able to determine if planting the potatoes versus eating them was a good investment.  Anything more than 8 pounds is good, but we're shooting for an abundant harvest.  We'll see how it goes...

The first step is to get out the pocketknife and quarter the potatoes, ensuring that you have eyes on each quarter.  Some of the seed potatoes were small, so I cut them in half or in thirds.

I arranged them cut-side up on trays and counted them.  Unfortunately, I lost count, but I'll count them again as I plant them.  It was over 110 pieces.  That's a lot of potato plants, if they all come up.

I then placed them out in the sun and wind and allowed the cut up potatoes to begin to heal, or as we call it, scab over.  This is an important step.  If not scabbed over, if you plant them, they are more likely to rot in the ground.

Since then, the weather has gotten cold and it's rained several times.  Being that it is so cold, the eyes on the potatoes haven't done any growing.  I think I'm going to put them in the warmest room in the house and see if we can't coax some growth.  When we plant, in a week or two, I'd like the eyes to show some more growth.

Fresh, new potatoes in the spring.  Looking forward to it!

Two Weeks Until the Spuds Go in the Ground

Then Isaac sowed in that land, and received in the same year an hundredfold: and the Lord blessed him.  Genesis 26:12

There are many verses in Scripture, particularly in the Gospels about the Parable of the Sower, in which the Lord talks about sowing and the multiplication of the seed, resulting in harvests of a hundredfold.  That's a great yield!  This year, we are going to track our harvest in our potato crop.  I've always enjoyed growing potatoes.  I can remember Irish Potatoes was the first thing my grandpa taught me to plant when I was a young boy.  Those are good memories about gardening that I still think about forty-something years later as I put in a garden each year.

I asked my wife to check out our local feed store for Seed Potatoes.  We generally plant the LaSoda variety.  The LaSoda is a red potato.  This variety was developed in 1948 by Louisiana State University Ag Experiment Station.  It is suited for our soils, climate and growing conditions.

Finally, Tricia texted me at work to let me know that seed potatoes were in.  You can see that we purchased 6 pounds of potatoes.  They were priced at $0.50 per pound or $3.00.  We have a whopping 10% sales tax in our parish, so after rendering to Ceasar what is Ceasar's, Tricia exited the feed store.  

I examined each potato for quality and all appeared to be good.  You can see right above my thumb in the photo below is one of the eyes of the potato.  My science teacher in high school, Stuart Buck, used to jokingly tell us that we should plant our potatoes wrapped in a newspaper so they'd have something to read while in the ground.  However, most newspapers today aren't worth wrapping fish in or lining a birdcage with , but that's neither here nor there and I digress.

Now you can plant the entire potato, OR you can cut the potato in pieces, ensuring that you have at least one eye in every potato chunk.  That's what I always do.  Each eye grows a nice potato plant.  I use a sharp knife to cut the potatoes up and then I turn them so that the cut side faces upward.  Then I place the potatoes inside in the warmest place I can find.  This will allow the cut part of the potato to 'scab' over.  I am told that if you immediately plant them without allowing them to scab, then the potatoes would rot in the ground.

I generally try to plant the spuds on or as close as possible to February 14th - Valentine's Day (since we love potatoes).  We'll see if the weather is cooperative.  They will mature in 110 to 120 days.  We know that we will put 6 pounds of potatoes in the ground.  A hundred-fold yield seems like a tall order!  We will track our harvest, though, and weigh it and report back our yield in early summer.

Prepping Seed Potatoes for the 2017 Crop

Tricia normally goes to the feed store every Friday morning to purchase Dairy Ration for the cows and goat, alfalfa, hen scratch, and the occasional bucket, rope or other item for the animals.  This past Friday, I sent her on a mission to come back with seed potatoes so that I could cut them and allow them to scab over so I could plant.  The mission was NOT accomplished.  The feed store was out of seed potatoes.  We had been beat to the punch.

Not to worry.  They proprietor had more seed potatoes on order and they would be in this week.  Tricia went back yesterday and picked up 15 pounds of seed potatoes. Looking at last year's crop that you can read about by clicking here, we will be hard-pressed to out-do the production of that crop.  The statistics in that post's second to last paragraph were very interesting to me.  Based on last year's figures, every pound of seed potatoes will produce 10 pounds of potatoes.

Here are 15 pounds of seed potatoes.  These should produce 150 pounds of potatoes if all goes according to plan.  Can you see the 'eyes' beginning to show themselves?

Last year we planted Lasoda Red Potatoes and Yukon Gold Potatoes.  I was really pleased with the Lasoda varieties' yield.  While the Yukon Gold variety didn't produce as well as the Lasoda, they stored really well.  I was looking forward to planting the La Soda variety again this year.  Well, wouldn't you know it, the Feed Store was unable to get their hands on any and instead, the variety they got was the Pontiac variety.  As the name suggests, they were developed in Michigan, while the La Soda variety was developed in Louisiana in 1948.  I guess we'll see how this northern cultivar grows down here.

The Pontiac had some nice eyes bulging.  I inspected each and they appeared to be in good shape with plenty of eyes.

Now you could plant each seed potato whole, but it wouldn't be very efficient.  I like to cut them up into chunks, ensuring that each chunk has at least one eye.  Each eye will grow a plant and each plant will produce some nice potatoes. So I grabbed a knife and started cutting.

Before too long I had two trays full of cut up seed potatoes.  But they are not quite ready for planting yet.

I like to leave them outside and let them scab over.  This allows the cut portion to heal and develop a hard protective layer.  I was taught by my grandpa to do this or you run the risk of the potatoes rotting in the ground.  I'll check them each day to see if the cut end has hardened and perhaps they'll be ready to plant this weekend.

As a little bonus, I do have some La Soda potatoes in the potato bin left over from last year's harvest in early May.  I'll plant them.  Even though they are small, they have long sprouts.  I think it will be interesting to plant the Pontiacs and some La Sodas and compare the yield.  It was great weather today. Hopefully the weather will hold as is through the weekend so that we can get them in the ground