[mumofstig]

I have just turned out the 35 Lt tub I had in the greenhouse, which had been lovingly watered and fertilised, and harvested 4 egg size spuds and a marble from 3 seed spuds put in.

Needless to say, I won't be bothering again

Quite a few of you were trying them this year, so are your results are any better than mine

[arugula]

Well yours did better than mine which didn't grow at all. Used the same Maris Pipers as the summer grown crop and it wasn't very good either.

[tosca100]

We had a large tub which we moved into the greenhouse when the first frost threatened. When the leaves died down we had a furtle and  decided, rather than leave them for Christmas we'd have them while they were still "new". No regrets, they were delicious and we had four meals from them. This was the first lot.

[Paul Plots]

This can be an expensive and time consuming experiment...

A chap a few plots over from me cleared a new half-plot and filled the lot with "Christmas potatoes"... He had spent a fortune on seed spuds but appeared not to have considered how he would protect them from frosts!! 

When they keeled over he apparently presumed: "It was either too dry or too wet!"

I did try to warn him when he mentioned planting them about keeping the foliage frost free but his enthusiasm prevented him listening.   

[aec]

Have not been on the forum for ages.  I had 3 planters of Kestrel for Christmas potatoes and harvested 2 just before the snow and frosts came and was quite surprised that I had quite a lot, and I still have some left for Christmas dinner.  The 3rd one which I have just recently emptied had about a dozen, and as I wasn't expecting any it was a nice surprise.  I don't have a greenhouse or anywhere to take them indoors, so everything was a bonus.  If I decide to do Christmas potatoes next year, I will look at ways of protecting them.

Christmas greetings to everyone.

aec

[Jamie Butterworth]

No! Mine were rubbish, snow killed them and managed to get 2 marble sized spuds from 3 seed potatoes, waste of time and money IMO

[davethespread]

did anyone else have a go at growing new pot for Christmas and what was the result. i actually got them out last night to go with a bit of steak there was enough for me the mrs and the boy for dinner last night. tasted lovely

[arugula]

Well done Dave! Mine didn't work but there's always next year.

[Kristen]

Same here. Light crop ... but some mitigating circumstances

4" manure in the bottom of the bag, three seed potatoes, 4" of compost.

Left the rest to earth up later.

Then found the box of special organic potato fertilizer in my office. Decided that needed to go under the seed potatoes so did nothing :O

Never got around to earthing-up, but I did water them. Didn't feed them.

They have been in the cold conservatory. No idea what the temperature is in there, but its attached to the house and sheltered so probably not frozen / much (but stand-alone greenhouse minimum has been -6C)

So plenty of room for improvement! but still got this from two bags (6 seed tubers):

[purplebean]

I still have two tubs of potatoes in the garden that I never got round to emptying, now the snow has gone I really should tip them out and see if there is anything worth eating in them

[Yabba]

I've still got some in planters to tip out.

I did some in planters, 1 seed per planter because I had enough planters, which went in my tiny lil 8x6, didn't get much of a yield from the ones I've already tipped out but enough from 4 seed for a meal. No pics of them but I'll try and remember to take pics when I get the rest.

The ones I slapped in the ground in the large greenhouse ( basically just a roof and no sides ) gave a better yield and the plants lasted longer before the frosts killed them.



It'd work out pretty expensive if I had to pay for seed spuds.

¥

[Iain@JBA]

It looks like a few success stories and a few that have just not worked out. I think as Yabba says you can achieve better results in the ground than in the containers.

Some one needs to develop a system that will allow fertilizer to be available to the potatoes for at least 12 weeks.

At the moment most compost has used its feeding value in 6 weeks so you get tremendous foliage growth and a poor crop down below.

[orchardlady]

I'm not really a veg gardener but my Mum is. What she did was to put some beautiful new potatoes from her summer crop into two Quality Street tins with very dry potting compost. She then sealed them with parcel tape and put them in a cool dark place away from frost at the back of her potting shed. She opened then up a day or so before Christmas. One tin was pure slime and the other was perfect. New potatoes for boxing day lunch what a treat.

OL

[kevinp]

I also had some success with my Christmas potatoes although I did eat them before Christmas I planted 12 Kestrel tubers from JBA mid august and I think they turned out pretty good most around the size of a chicken egg some larger some smaller. No damaged to spud at all and pretty good tasting I still have two in the ground as they were frozen in when I went to get them so if I go over today I will take a pick of them. Just to note that I cut the tops off after the fist frosts they were earthed up quite high and this is a new plot and has never been grown on before.

Would I do them again, yes but I would do more and probably feed them next time, over all good idea.

[PennyS]

Mine were planted out in the ground in August but died off after only a few weeks.
I harvested some in late October (I think), when I was clearing the ground.  I earthed the rest up more and left them.

Come Christmas Eve I thought I'd be harvesting tatties galore but found a bare few....
Never mind still worth trying again next year!