[kippers garden]

I have always dug manure in Autumn into my potato bed ready for the following April when i plant my potatoes.  I have never used a potato fertiliser and always got an ok crop from them.

I was wondering if i could get a fantastic crop if i used a special potato fertiliser?  However, i have 160 spuds (Marfona x 50 2nd earlies, and piccasso maincrop x 50 and Sarpo mira x 60 maincrop)....if i used fertiliser for all my potatoes then wouldn't it become expensive?

How do you all fertilise your potatoes?

[flitwickone]

i sprinkle growmore once ive planted and when the neighbouring plants meet i sprinke a little more and thats  it 

[Rhiannon]

I normaly use Growmore and manure for my Runner beans, however this year i got some Nutrimate and a big bag of potato fertilizer from the supplier of my seed potatoes . Yeild is normaly Ok but never anything special, i grow in bags as we are very prone to scab, ive tried Sulphur stuff but it does not do a lot of good.

[Ma and Pa Snip]

Only having a rear garden which we have mostly turned into raised bed vegetable growing beds we are not able to plant on anywhere near the scale you do.

On the potato front we manage to find space for between 30 > 50 tubers, on those we use growmore and are pleased with the results we get.

[Hobnails]

I like to put wilted comfrey leaves under the sets and then follow on with Growmore as I earth up. Pleased with the results, but this year the comfrey is late so I'll use it when I get as  liquid manure and see how it goes.
You can spend a lot of money on fancy preparations and additives and i'm not sure any benefit from them justifies their cost. i like to keep things simple and Growmore is about as far as i go with buy-in fertilisers.

[Swing Swang]

Spuds are hungry. N P K and Mg can be supplied with the liberal use of organic manures, and if I had plenty of manure I'd probably only use a bit of brimstone on my patch. As it is I use a potato-specific inorganic fertiliser as well as brimstone.

Fertiliser goes in the bottom of the trench and is mixed in with the soil/compost so as not to burn the spuds, brimstone gets sprinkled on to of the 'ridges'.

Best spudswe ever grew were on land that had housed chickens for 20 years - no fertiliser in the first year - on the chalky chiltern's so scab was an issue as no brimstone used.

[Aunt Sally]

I use potato fertiliser.  I think it's gives a good crop.

[Trillium]

When we plant our potatoes, we dig a hole, add about a tablespoon of fertilizer, scratch a bit of soil over that, set the potato in and cover. We manure almost every fall but find the bit of fertilizer kick starts the plants and we always get a fantastic, tasty crop.

[Ivor Backache]

Yes I use a potato fertiliser. General fertiser has too much nitrogen and you get too much top. I use to use Q4 which is the type you need because it is high high in Potassium. Then I realised rose fertiliser has a similar composition  and there are always rose fertilisers in the sale at the end of the season.  I apply it when hoeing up.

[azubah]

I use pigeon muck. The smellier the better. Wonderful stuff. Can't get enough of it. One man's rubbish is another man's treasure.

[braders1234]

I use pigeon muck. The smellier the better. Wonderful stuff. Can't get enough of it. One man's rubbish is another man's treasure.

Do you do anything to prepare it, or is just straight into the ground?

[galen]

At long last, I keep saying "I saw this and that in a post when I joined" this forum a couple of years ago and for once I actually kept this as a link as it did sound, and has proven, very useful

http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=31465.0

Don't care about anyone else but I'm going to give myself a big 

[azubah]

I use pigeon muck. The smellier the better. Wonderful stuff. Can't get enough of it. One man's rubbish is another man's treasure.

Do you do anything to prepare it, or is just straight into the ground?

I just dig it straight into the ground, feathers, dead birds, eggs, and all, (most of it is really horrible) but I always leave it at least couple of months to soak in, and give it another dig to mix it if necessary...which it usually is! I don't sow seeds into it, just put potatoes or plants big enough to survive it. It can get a bit slimy for a while.