Therefore, getting fresh potatoes at the beginning of the summer season, and not by August-September is for the summer resident can be very important. What are the secrets of early harvest? I’m not a professional botanist-potato, but early potatoes to the first decade of June at home grow. I will not repeat the basic truths, but will offer you my vision of this issue.
First secret. Choose the right variety
Any instruction on growing potatoes begins with this — with the choice of seed. Potatoes, as you know, usually propagated vegetatively, that is, planting tubers. They are called in everyday life “seeds”.
Now on sale there are real — Botanical seeds. But growing potatoes from them is a different story.
The choice of variety is always a responsible thing, even if you plan to grow simple potatoes. To get an early harvest, you need to choose varieties with a short vegetation period: early (50-60 days) and ultra-early (45-55 days).
Early called cultivars, which not only ripen quickly, but also have a short period of winter rest. As a rule, they begin to germinate by the New year. Therefore, such potatoes should go to the table in the first place.
I will not list the names and advise something — everyone’s preferences are different and the conditions (climatic, soil) in each garden are different. As it turned out in a recent conversation on our website, the same variety in one area is good, and in another — it does not happen worse. So try, plant, look for a suitable potato for you for early planting. But remember the main principle: to get the harvest in June, you need to choose the earliest varieties.
Second secret. Choose tubers for planting
If you have already decided on the variety and use part of your crop for planting, you need to choose tubers for seeds during its collection. And dig potatoes need time — fully ripe. Then the harvest is better stored, less affected by disease. It is ideal to choose seeds at the stage of growing bushes, noting the most developed of them, having at least three stems. And when digging, tubers are selected from the most productive nests noted earlier, where potatoes are maximally aligned in size.
And, of course, the seeds take on a smooth, appropriate to the varietal description of the shape and color of tubers. They should not have traces of viral and fungal infections, as well as damage — we want to get not only early, but also a healthy harvest.
It is not necessary to leave the seeds of small and underdeveloped tubers, but also to choose the Champions in size is also not necessary. It is believed that the optimal size of potatoes for planting — with a chicken egg, that is, weighing 60-80 g.
It’s logical. Very small tuber, most likely, formed later than the main number of potatoes in the nest, for example, under the prevailing particularly favorable conditions for the plant in the second half of the growing season. Therefore, it is likely that he did not have time to Mature qualitatively, gain enough nutrients and form a full kidney.
Potatoes-the heroes are good for eating, but from the point of view of the prospects for the future harvest “suffer infantilism”. Using a large supply of nutrients in the mother tuber, their sprouts are in no hurry at the initial stage to build up their own roots, while the earth is wet after spring. And when stocks end, there comes a summer heat with a lack of moisture. And such a Bush as a result inferior to his brother, who at the start of the food was only the necessary emergency stock.
On the other hand, to choose the seeds of the largest tubers is also a reason. But with the condition that you will cut them when planting in parts or even separate from the tuber only sprouts with a small piece of flesh. That’s how advised to plant potatoes “lazy gardener”. And good genes are taken, and not given the opportunity to “sit until old age on the mother’s neck.”
Third secret. Properly store planting material
The tubers selected for seeds are laid for storage until spring. Before that, it is necessary to carry out the correct preparation – to process to improve the safety, and most importantly, to get healthy plants in the next season.
Some bacterial and fungal infections (for example, Fusarium dry and wet bacterial rot) affect tubers during harvesting and storage, so you need to do the following. The dug-out potatoes should, first, be washed (especially if the cleaning was rainy weather). This procedure is time-consuming, so if not all, then at least the seed tubers should be washed. Second, dry thoroughly.
Within 2-3 weeks, we provide the skin with the opportunity to get stronger. Seed potatoes it is advisable proselyte: produced by solanine will provide additional protection.
Washing tubers will not protect against all misfortunes, as the pathogens of infections can already hide inside. Most often — under the eyes. Therefore, experts advise to process the entire crop. Intended for food — biological agents that block the spread of infection on the potato surface. And seed — chemicals that destroy micro-organisms. This may be a pink solution of potassium permanganate or a weak solution of copper sulfate (not more than 2 g per 10 liters of water).
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