Ashley Powell

Thank you Ron! Sounds like they're okay, I'm gonna let the vines die on their own.

Cy, good point about it taking a while for the virus load to accumulate. I'm planning to grow the potatoes as a "biennial"...save tubers this year, then save TPS the following year, so I can start fresh with viruses from time to time.

Hi,

I'm growing potatoes from Cultivariable TPS, wide tetraploid mix. This is year 2 of this venture; I planted out the mini tubers I harvested in year 1, so this is my first "real" crop. I'm in central VA in zone 7, and I planted out the mini tubers on March 18th. Now I'm at the 120 day mark and expected the vines to die down--they have a lot of disease but aren't dying back all that much yet. My question is, when should I harvest?

I pulled one plant yesterday to see how the spuds were doing, and some were ready but most still really small. I can't tell if the taters are small because they need more time in the ground, because of disease, or because I accidentally crowded the plants (the vines ended up being way more massive than I expected).

Should I let them ride until first frost? I'm afraid the blight & assorted diseases (and I'm guessing there are several lol) will get into the tubers. Attaching pics of the vines and the potatoes I dug up yesterday.

Thank you!!!

Thanks for sharing the pics. I'm going to try sowing in the canopy and see what happens, I do see some vines that are on the way out so the timing might work. At any rate, I already bought the seeds (mix of Austrian winter peas, winter wheat, triticale, and small % of a bunch of other stuff) so might as well try!

Thanks guys. It seems like undersowing is the way. I think I missed that boat, the canopy is too full now. Spring it is!

Hi,

I'm wondering about timing options for sowing a winter cover in central Virginia (7a). Our average first frost is Nov 1, so the time to plant a winter cover would be mid-late September I think. While some of my crops are on their way out or done, others matured slowly this year and are only now hitting their stride (ahem, peppers). So my question is: is it normal to sacrifice some productivity from one's summer garden to sow winter cover? Or are winter cover crops solely used to follow short season plantings? If the latter, do you try to squeeze in a spring cover before transplanting summer crops?

I plan to cut my plants at the base and tarp the residue before sowing the cover crop. When I cut/tarped my bolting low tunnel winter kale/spinach before transplanting out my summer crops, it only took about a week for the residue to pretty much disintegrate. But of course, summer crops are a lot larger--okra, tomatillos, tomatoes, sprawling cuke vines, etc. Can I chop their residue and tarp? Or should I haul them off and properly compost them?

This is my first "real" summer garden, it has been a great season so far. Thanks in advance for any advice!!

Ashley