spuds

[keat63]

Rather than buying seed potatoes, I considered just buying a sack of spuds from the farm shop. £3.00 for about 20 seeds, or £4.00 for a huge sack full of spuds.
However, I did my research first and decided that maybe planting 'eating' spuds was maybe not a good idea, it was certainly frowned up and advised against.

However, what are your thoughts on sacrificing some of this years crop to grow next year ?

[4Shoes]

I seem to remember there are 6 classification of seed potatoes (well in Scotland anyway) and each year they drop down a clasification until they fall into general eating. They are inspected 2 times and any alien or unhealthy potatoes removed to leave a nice uniform field before final inspection.

They are then graded for size and resold for seed....

Eating potatoes can be any potato over sized for seed or any potatoes that fail classification or have dropped out of classification.

The problem with planting eating potatoes is that you don't know if they are disease free. However if you plant classified seed, then you know, and if they are disease free , can hold back some for "your seed" the following year.

[bikermike]

I grew some supermarket Charlotte and got blackleg

that being said, my pink firs are 2nd gen saved (ie bought in 16, saved and planted for 17 and now 18) and growing nicely

[burnie]

The risk is a whole season could be lost, time and effort versus save a few bob? I buy certified seed and I also usually miss a few and get some free ones after gathering last years crop.
Welcome by the way

[nickdub]

Rather than buying seed potatoes, I considered just buying a sack of spuds from the farm shop. £3.00 for about 20 seeds, or £4.00 for a huge sack full of spuds.
However, I did my research first and decided that maybe planting 'eating' spuds was maybe not a good idea, it was certainly frowned up and advised against.

However, what are your thoughts on sacrificing some of this years crop to grow next year ?

Depends really on how many spuds you want, I think. If you have an ordinary sized garden then a few seed potatoes from B&Q for £2 or a cheapo shop is not a major expense - if you are planting on a larger scale and money is tight, my advice would be to have a look round at places selling 12.5 Kg bags of locally grown spuds and buy a few over the winter keeping the best looking and reasonable sized ones to plant next year. Buying local means that you'll probably get ones that a local farmer grew from seed himself that year and so the chances of them being diseased is much less and they'll be ones picked to do OK in your area. Try for a mix of varsities too, which you are more likely to find if you buy bags at different times.

[keat63]

I actually bought half a dozen bags of seed from Wilco at £3.00 per bag. Enough really for 2 plots @ 5 x 10m each.

[Derbydal]

I grew some supermarket Charlotte and got blackleg

that being said, my pink firs are 2nd gen saved (ie bought in 16, saved and planted for 17 and now 18) and growing nicely

I saved some pink firs from last year and planted two rows and they are just starting to come through! I don't know if they got knocked back with the weather but they seem very slow ! the other spuds are ok apart from the ones that the badgers have had ! lol atb Dal.