Dennis, I always planted white or Irish potatoes, usually late February or early March, and harvested the last of them the end of May or early June. I've discarded my old records with all the specifics, but I do see that in 1998, I planted on March 5, dug the last of them on June 2. In 1999, I planted on Feb. 10 and we had a frost on March 15 when the plants had broken into sight but they all recovered.
My grandfather always planted by the signs of the moon. Now I can't say whether that's important or not, but since I had to plant sometime . . . well, I bought a copy of The Old Farmers Almanac every year and planted everything by their schedule.
I have always been fond of canned new potatoes; still am. When I was a kid, we'd sit outside with a washtub of little potatoes and water, and scrape the peeling off the potatoes before canning them. But in the 90s I learned that if you get them good and clean, you can can them with the peeling still on, and then when you open a jar to use them, you can just pull all that peeling off without scraping or showing any damage to the potato.
Bird,
My wife was relating/refreshing her experience in potato farming after I read her your post.
As a little girl she spent the summers on her uncle's 200 acre potato farm. It was sandy river bottom fields right next to the river so was ideal for raising potatoes.
He had 2 old 1 cylinder John Deere tractors with the power wheel on the side for a big belt and a shaft on the back. She just loves the sound of that put-put-put.
After the 4th of July he would take his cattle truck up to a small town nearby and load all the men and women that didn't have jobs and their kids in the back of the truck and haul them to the farm. The day before he used a roto-beater over the rows to pulverize all the tops and weeds.
He had a two row digger attachment that dug the potatoes, shook the dirt off and left them laying on top of the ground.
The little girls and boys put the potatoes in bushel baskets a few feet behind the machine. The potatoes couldn't lay in the sun too long or they turned green. They were payed 6 cents a bushel in cash at the end of the week. My wife started doing this at age 6. She could pick about 50 bushel a day so about $3.00 for 7-8 hours in the 80-90 degree heat. The bigger kids could pick up to 100 bushel a day.
The boys that were strong enough to lift the baskets loaded them on a wagon.
Back at the barn other boys dumped the bushel baskets into a conveyor hopper that had a sorting/grading system.
They left the calls and tiny one in the field. The # 3's dropped into canvas bags first, then further up the # 2's and off the end # 1's which in that ground were the majority of the potatoes. The wives helped along the line picking dirt and weeds. When the #1 bag was judged to be about 100 pound, in a minute or less, a boy put them on a scale. Then a few added or removed to get the weight right. A man would grab a corner whip the string around it, sew to the other side, make another ear and tie it off. Then another man would drag the bag by the ears to a stack and others would stack them.
Remember the "bag ear" discussion Brandi started recently about the feed bag?
The # 3's were used for hog food, the # 2's eaten by the workers/locals and my wife's family and dogs.
The number 1's were taken to town and purchased by buyers from up north in the Cleveland area.
Many years they would take the potatoes, promise to pay, but didn't at all or were months late.
She says the potatoes that are sold in stores today as #1 grade are what they considered #2's
back in the days when they were graded at the farm.
That part of her life experience is why she has always been such a hard worker and I have since never discouraged her from the habit.
