How many tatties?

[Maddiesaur]

I appreciate that this is probably going to be a tough one to answer but some generalising is fine just to give me a rough idea..

As per my thread in the Allotment section of the forum, I'll be growing this year to cut back on food costs/boost the food we currently eat to be both more healthy AND filling.

I'd love to do potatoes for the autumn and winter months but don't know where to start. Happy to try different varieties but really, what I would like to know is how many do I plant for me and my partner? I don't want to plant too few and only get a couple meals worth. Lots won't go to waste as we will store them/give them to family or friends.. but I don't want so many that the beds are cramped and we end up with lots of rotting potatoes both on the lot AND in the house.

I've three beds available, each roughly 1.5mx2m in size. These are what I'd like to use as some trial and error beds for the likes of the potatoes.

Where do I start? lol

[Potstubsdustbins]

Hope you mean Tatties.

Back to reality how many spuds do you eat in a week?

There is just me and my wife. For main crop I plant 30 odd tubers and with storage these would last until mid March but we do eat a lot of spuds because we both love them.

Potty

[Maddiesaur]

Oh well spotted, fixed that lol!

Yes we eat quite a few too. How much space do those take up potstubsdustbins?

[sparrow100]

I put 34 in last year - 4 Duke of York, 16 Charlottes and 14 Desiree. It wasn't the greatest of years for me, but we were eating spuds from July till the beginning of December. The bed was 1.2m x 3.6m. I also put a few in buckets around the paths as they can be easily moved/jumped over.

[Two_Sheds]

I'd love to do potatoes for the autumn and winter months

You'll need to plant maincrop then. The trouble with spuds is blight. It comes along August ish, and can destroy your entire crop overnight. I think spuds are one of the cheapest things to buy in the supermarket, even cheaper from a farm gate, so I wouldn't be using up much space for them, personally, I'd be growing crops that are expensive to buy (fruit & salads, perhaps)

how many do I plant for me and my partner?

When I work out how many to grow, I do some basic maths, eg we eat spuds once a week, and one plant will last us 2 weeks. So the maths is 52 (weeks) x half a plant = 26 plants/seed spuds

It's a very rough measure, but works for me because I have lots of space (10 rods)

How much space do those take up ?

Maincrops should be planted about 18" apart from each other

[Kristen]

I think spuds are one of the cheapest things to buy in the supermarket, even cheaper from a farm gate, so I wouldn't be using up much space for them, personally, I'd be growing crops that are expensive to buy (fruit & salads, perhaps)

Me too

Other thing I have found is that Farm Shop gets spuds out of fancy cold store, so they aren't sprouting ... whereas my self-stored spuds are both sprouting and starting to go soft by the turn of the year. Yesteryear they would have been in a clamp, and deteriorating somewhat, and people would have "made do", but I find they are cheap to buy, particularly by the large bag, and in great condition when bought [mid Winter]

We don't eat crops out-of-season much, but we do freeze some Summer-glut, so an alternative to storing fresh would be to freeze Runner Beans and the like.

[Maddiesaur]

Thanks folks, just what I needed to know x