http://www.durgan.org/ShortURL/?SUTFA 15 August 2008 Superior Potatoes from 12 plants Digging the last of the Superior Potatoes. There were 12 plants in total remaining, and two were chitted. The average weight of the chitted potatoes from each plant was 1630 grams, and the average weight of the not chitted was 1403 grams. No conclusion can be drawn from this small sample regarding chitting for Superior potatoes, but not chitted has a slight edge. The total weight of the 12 plants was 17.29 kilograms or 38 pounds. Planting to harvest was 119 days. http://www.durgan.org/ShortURL/?DLIZU The full detail about Potatoes in 2oo8.
So far I am not convinced, that the procedure has any real merit, but my sample is very small, There are another 24 plants to dig, and about ten to compare for chitted to non-chitted. Certainly the Superior are probably better not chitted from my limited sample results. The effort will have to be repeated many times to ascertain a trend, since there are so many variables, weather, soil, sun, etc. Had there been a major difference, I would have jumped on the bandwagon, and have been an advocate of the procedure, such is not the case.
It will be interesting to see what your final results are. I haven't started digging up my potatoes. I will probably wait another couple of weeks. My potatoes weren't chitted.
I will count them and let you know! My potato plants haven't shown any sign of dying down yet. Do you usually wait until they start to die before you harvest?
I dig a few for eating during the growing season, but for the main harvest, I dig just before th tops disappear. It helps to locate the area to dig if a bit of dying vegetation is still around. As long as some healthy green is present, I suppose the tubers are still growing a bit. Also If it is very wet, it is a good idea not to leave the tubers soaking for any long period.
