[DD.]

Any reports, good or bad, or are you wating until the last minute?

[The Norfolk Turkey]

Ours were a bit quick - Ate them roasted on bonfire night, didnt make it this far!!   

They were good though!

[Jonajo]

lovely. I managed to pick a few kilo at the weekend ("emerald vale"). Lovely boiled with some butter. Comfort winter eating!!

And managed to harvest most of my roasting winter spuds ("Vivaldi") - such a wonderful flavour when roasted - sweetish, nutty and moreish. Ordered more for next year and am on the look out for other tasty potatoes that can roast - Maris Piper and King Edward are fine but something nicer and different to try.

And that is one of the most exciting things of having the space to grow veg: being able to try a variety of the same veg rather than be restricted to just a few standard varieties of a typical vegetable in the shops.

[aelf]

going for mine tomorrow but not holding my breath! The frost got them despite being in the green house. I didn't get them in early enough either.

Will let you know...

[beansticks]

I planted some in a large sack in the greenhouse,variety Carlingford,have not looked yet,though i am a bit pessimistic the foliage died back some weeks ago,lack of water i think.

[JohnB47]

going for mine tomorrow but not holding my breath! The frost got them despite being in the green house. I didn't get them in early enough either.

Will let you know...

Same here, although mine are on the allotment. Santa will be bringing me a new pair of gardening boots so I'm planning to go up on Christmas morning and see what's there. Not hopefull though. Still, the sprouts are nice - they definitely improve with a bit of frost.

[Iain@JBA]

Feed back that I have had has been very good.
In general most peoples foliage died back by the end of November.
A vast majority of people grew them in potato planter bags and moved them indoors now that the weather is really bad.
They plan to empty the bags out on Christmas morning and eat what they have harvested.
I put my planter bags indoors during mid November and stopped watering at the start of December when the shaws showed the first sign of die back.
I let the plant then suck all the moisture out of the compost and tipped the bags out the other day as I couldn't wait any longer.
What I planted were - Maris Peer - King Edward and Maris Piper.
3 potatoes were placed into each 40litre potato planter as I think 5 is too many.
I used my usual mix of 16oz of fertilizer and I also used a little drop of nutrimate just to give them a boost which was added to 100litres of compost.
But anyway onto the results -
Maris Peer gave me 3kilos of very nice sized potatoes which I just boiled and ate with a touch of Butter.
King Edward being an early maincrop produced 3.2kg of nice roasting sized spuds.
Maris Piper were almost identical and produced 3kg of roasters.
The proof will be in the cooking on Friday.

I am very happy with those results and next year I will try some more varieties.

I have started some Swift off now in my greenhouse and see how I get on.

If you are going to do it next year I would say grow them in containers and move indoors at the first sign of cold weather. Patios or such like would be ideal.

My next experiment will be to see if allowing the bags to suck up water is better than tipping the old watering can over the top of the bag which could cause compaction.

[beansticks]

I planted some in a large sack in the greenhouse,variety Carlingford,have not looked yet,though i am a bit pessimistic the foliage died back some weeks ago,lack of water i think.

My pessimissim was well founded,emptied the sack today to discover very small quantity of spuds.Will not bother again.

[Janeymiddlewife]

I managed to harvest 12 small egg sized Cara from a small plastic box on the patio, literally about 2 foot deep by 3 foot x 1 foot and they were yummy. I'm hoping for a lot more from my dustbin, which is currently frozen on top. Amazingly only 2 in the plastic box were frosted, so fingers crossed!

[PennyS]

We only took over an uncultivated plot in July, so August bank holiday weekend I took a punt and put in 10 Maris Peer I bought from an ebay supplier.

The foliage did die back in late Oct/early November and I put on a double layer of fleece.

We have harvested them over the last couple of weeks.  Not a massive crop and some affected by eelworm or something similar, but very satisfying nevertheless!

Can't wait til next year with a proper crop.

Penny 

[Elcie]

I need to check what mine have done!  To be honest, the foliage died a bit early so I am not very hopeful and that is why I didn't rush out into the garden to check them earlier, but you never know I suppose!  I would do it again but plant a little earlier, I kept forgetting and they could have probably had an extra month.

[Aidy]

Again I had not  botherd to grow them after failings years  ago, however one chap on our site has  bags  full. Others on the site have also been trying and they are no where as good so what he did different we will have to try and extract.

[JohnB47]

Well, I've dug up one of my plants and got just one of the smallest potatoes you ever saw. But I ate it with my Chrismas dinner anyway! I cooked it with the sprouts, which were delicious (Doric).

I probably planted too late (mid Oct) and then the frost got them. I'll try again next year but will have a better plan of action.

[Sid]

Mine were the same,very small,but they were tasty.
Haven't dug em all up though,.

Can I leave them in or should I dig them all up? have not grown spuds before so have alot to learn .

[DD.]

Has the foliage died off?  If it has, they won't grow any more.