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To: Pollard

For potatoes I like the Kennebec and Red Pontiac.

They do VERY well in this area, or at least in my garden.

I’ll have to take some pictures and figure out how to post them.


138 posted on 04/15/2022 11:16:01 AM PDT by metmom (...fixing our eyes on Jesus, the Author and Perfecter of our faith…)
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To: metmom

Kennebec and Red Pontiac are most popular here as seed or eating potatoes. The stores do sell Yukon for eating but they’re not very cheap. Reds are cheaper aside from cute packages of tiny red new potatoes. We just like Yukon best and I’ve had good luck growing them. Nice sized and smooth. Did really good one year when my soil was extra fluffy from having dragged forest humus from nearby onto the garden and tilled it in. Yukons as big a baking russets, nice and smooth and good oblong shaped. We do bake(microwave) the big ones. Good all purpose potato. When I get a root cellar built, I’ll grow Russets because they do store best.

The forest humus is basically leaf mold so that ought to be a good amendment for these container potatoes. In fact I may use that as cover instead of mowed up leaves and also add the forest humus to the soil to lighten it up. Leaf mold humus is fluffy and drains well. Maybe do a 90/10 mix of humus to very aged goat manure which is about 1.3-1.0-3.0. Then add a tiny bit of bone meal to bump up the P to about 3 to match the K of goat manure. Use that as cover and also mix that 50/50 with the soil. Or just use that mix to add to the soil and use straight leaf humus to cover.

I’ve got low spots I’ve been raking leaves into for 10 years so I have plenty of leaf mold humus. Being low spots that run parallel to the slope, they have had a lot of water run through so I imagine the humus is pretty neutral having been thoroughly rinsed. Oak leaves start out as 0.8-0.35-0.2 but N doesn’t last long.

My neighbor, who’s big on white powder fertilizer/pesticides, tilled a bunch of leaves into his potato plot one year and said it was the best crop ever. We have oak/hickory forest here and it’s 90% oak / 10% hickory.


139 posted on 04/15/2022 12:16:14 PM PDT by Pollard (PureBlood -- https://youtube.com/watch?v=VXm0fkDituE)
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