Digging for gold

Until today we've been harvesting potatoes on an as-needed basis. We head out with our dirty garden shoes on, with or without our gloves, and find a plant that is close to done or all done. We've been digging up supper, or a gift for a friend, or some for a soup for later. We seem to have an unending supply, and we haven't been very thorough or careful thus far.

According to my planting and harvesting guide, the baby potatoes are best eaten the day they are dug. For potatoes that are to be stored and eaten months later, the best practice is to dig them, then allow them to cure in the field for 2 or 3 days. So this afternoon we started the process of harvesting some of the potatoes which we will store and eat this fall and winter. We moved from plant to plant, brushing off loose and not-so-loose dirt, and piling our booty in the dirt behind us.

We have probably dug up about a third of the potatoes so far. I think we have enough time to wait to harvest the rest, since we aren't in danger of frost too soon. The issue here is more likely to be heavy rain. I think we'll want to have most of them dug by the end of the month, and we may have to cure them in the garage so they won't get rained on. I ended up putting today's haul in a container because I was worried about animals. Mostly the neighborhood cats, who have been using patch as a litter box here and there. Would hate to come back to the pile and find some cat had marked it as theirs.

The potatoes have been a very fun and easy experiment. I highly recommend it for its high yield in delicious food, for very little investment of time and effort.