Tubers

So you decided to plant potatoes this year! You’re excited and confident until you go to pull your seed potatoes out of storage and…they’re shriveled. Does that mean they’ve all gone bad? Will squishy, wrinkled potatoes actually produce healthy potato plants? Yes, you can plant shriveled potatoes. Even though shriveled seed potatoes don’t look appetizing,…

I remember those early spring days when my family would take my brother and me out in the fields to help them plant potatoes as far as the eye could see. We packed big bags of seed potatoes and there was a lot of digging involved – trenching and hilling up. Us kids were responsible…

Growing big potatoes has become much harder in recent years as erratic shorter growing seasons caused by climate change has massively impacted their growing windows, but freak events like the recent giant potato news in New Zealand have given gardeners reason to be hopeful. If you’re wondering why your homegrown potatoes are smaller than you…

The humble potato is an essential part of our western diets, and it’s quickly replacing grain as a major crop worldwide. And for good reason – potatoes grow faster and do well in worse conditions than grain, not to mention that they’re far more nutritious (think half an adult’s daily dose of vitamin C for…

Sweet potatoes will grow however you tell them to, as long as you understand their basic nature, and growing sweet potatoes in raised beds is a great place to start if you have the space to spare. Our guide to sweet potato container gardening has all the steps on getting started, whatever sized space you’re…

Growing sweet potatoes in the UK isn’t simple, but it needn’t be complicated either. This guide gives straightforward advice and fail-safe instructions on getting the most out of that delicious tuber. Everyone has that one crop they’ve just never had any luck with. For me, it’s sweet potatoes, but this year I had a gigantic…