Growing Potatoes/manfalang

[SAP]

Having dug up the rest of potatoes in the seed bed this afternoon and getting 8 golf-ball size taters out of 11 roots was a bit disappointing, although they were lovey with the whites of shallot stems and bertolli butter.

Having studied all the posts on here again, i see that tempeture and ground is important, {never gave this much thought back in Suffolk UK, just put them in and dig them up later, all done!! }..

To combine Saps temp and Soidogs tamarind leaves in the soil, i came up with this idea, Our irrigation pipeline from the borehole via holding tank and booster pump runs 50mts before the papaya plantation, the 2in blue pvc goes under 3 large tamarind trees. so if i dig ground 1yd wide, 1ft deep under the shade of the trees, bury the pipe in the middle and plant potates either side, the irrigation does run at night when needed, day or night the water is icy cold coming from 23mts down, this shoud keep the ground cool, the decomposed tamarind shells/leaves/fruit should give a good compost, plus i can add some buffalo shit, or 50-50-50 that we use on papaya, watering no problem,

Besides pest control ect, can any of you good posters see a downside to this, Thanks, Lickey..

Lickey I think you are on the right track, maybe try and buy some drip tape and irrigate every day, of course being careful to not to over irrigate. You could even try putting valve in the pipe before the potatoes, and close it right down and just constantly put a small amount of water 24hrs a day (again if you over irrigate you could loose it all).

I would not grow the potatoes in the shade, the more sunlight the better just need to keep the soil cool and moist. You just likely to get leaf diseases like late blight. And if possible never irrigate the leaves as you are more likely to get leaf diseases. Drip line irrigation is the best.

Constantly apply N&K upto about 70 days after planting. We apply fert every 7-10 days.

Are you going to dry and grow them in the wet season?

Seed potato management is of course very important, for home gardeners in Thailand my best advice is try and get seed that is 4-6 months after it has been harvested. If the seed is too young it will grow slowly and only produce 2-3 tubers per plant. If the seed is too old. It will grow too many weak feeble stems and have a lot of marble to golf ball size tubers.

[ozzydom]

Having dug up the rest of potatoes in the seed bed this afternoon and getting 8 golf-ball size taters out of 11 roots was a bit disappointing, although they were lovey with the whites of shallot stems and bertolli butter.

Having studied all the posts on here again, i see that tempeture and ground is important, {never gave this much thought back in Suffolk UK, just put them in and dig them up later, all done!! }..

To combine Saps temp and Soidogs tamarind leaves in the soil, i came up with this idea, Our irrigation pipeline from the borehole via holding tank and booster pump runs 50mts before the papaya plantation, the 2in blue pvc goes under 3 large tamarind trees. so if i dig ground 1yd wide, 1ft deep under the shade of the trees, bury the pipe in the middle and plant potates either side, the irrigation does run at night when needed, day or night the water is icy cold coming from 23mts down, this shoud keep the ground cool, the decomposed tamarind shells/leaves/fruit should give a good compost, plus i can add some buffalo shit, or 50-50-50 that we use on papaya, watering no problem,

Besides pest control ect, can any of you good posters see a downside to this, Thanks, Lickey..

Lickey I think you are on the right track, maybe try and buy some drip tape and irrigate every day, of course being careful to not to over irrigate. You could even try putting valve in the pipe before the potatoes, and close it right down and just constantly put a small amount of water 24hrs a day (again if you over irrigate you could loose it all).

I would not grow the potatoes in the shade, the more sunlight the better just need to keep the soil cool and moist. You just likely to get leaf diseases like late blight. And if possible never irrigate the leaves as you are more likely to get leaf diseases. Drip line irrigation is the best.

Constantly apply N&K upto about 70 days after planting. We apply fert every 7-10 days.

Are you going to dry and grow them in the wet season?

Seed potato management is of course very important, for home gardeners in Thailand my best advice is try and get seed that is 4-6 months after it has been harvested. If the seed is too young it will grow slowly and only produce 2-3 tubers per plant. If the seed is too old. It will grow too many weak feeble stems and have a lot of marble to golf ball size tubers.

As we have quite a few expert Google farmers on these threads ,I will add a little reference here, if its about spuds,Phil (SAP) is the farm manager of a very large potato growing farm in N/E Thailand,and his advise is invaluable.

I had the pleasure of a cooks tour of his farm and it is most impressive.

Only problem he is a kiwi so sheep are not allowed there.

[Lickey]

Ozzy, thanks for your reference of SAP {Spuds and Potatoes? } Phil, saying i have my plot ready, about 20ft long 1 yd wide with the 2"pipe burried in the middle and some buffalo shit dug in, i think its ok under near the tamarind trees as they are not in full bloom yet, because im not doing this on a grand scale i dont think its worth me buying pukka seed potatoes, supposing i could find some spuds that the skin comes of in the hand, or some good firm young looking spuds, how would i store these for the alloted time, im sure they need a cool place,

Thanks, Lickey..

[chownah]

Lickley,

About storing the potatoes....I've been wanting a cool place to store seeds...where rats can't get at them. I'm considering buying a cheap refrigerator expressly for the purpose of storing seeds....I would probably research the best temp on the internet (probably around 40 or 45 degrees Fahrenheit) and just adjusting the fridge temp so it only goes to that temp....shouldn't take much elec to run a fridge at such a high temperature and also the door would probably be opened fairly infrequently so this would minimize power req's too. What do you think?

Chownah

[Lickey]

I was thinking along the same lines Chownah, Back in UK we used to keep them in the coldest frost/rat free room in the house, for over-wintering seed spuds, King Edward and Majestic are my favorites, good all round potaoes!!

Im kicking myself now and here is the reason, we should be moving into wifes new salon next month, it is basically our own design, why,why,why didnt i have a cellar?? its got to be the coolest place in the house, not just for potatoes, but for me.beer, food storage ect,any storage really, correctly done it should be cool, watertight and vermin free, isnt afterthought great!!! matter of interest, has anybody got a cellar??

Cheers, Lickey..

[ozzydom]

Ozzy, thanks for your reference of SAP {Spuds and Potatoes? } Phil, saying i have my plot ready, about 20ft long 1 yd wide with the 2"pipe burried in the middle and some buffalo shit dug in, i think its ok under near the tamarind trees as they are not in full bloom yet, because im not doing this on a grand scale i dont think its worth me buying pukka seed potatoes, supposing i could find some spuds that the skin comes of in the hand, or some good firm young looking spuds, how would i store these for the alloted time, im sure they need a cool place,

Thanks, Lickey..

You definately need a cool area ,where I come from is cool anyway so we used to keep about 4 ton in one of the stables, but in this day of certified seed that has gone by the board (along with our Clydesdales) and the seed is kept in cool rooms,Temp , I would only be guessing at but too cold and the spuds tend to de-hydrate, a fridge may be ok but you need some air circulation or they will rot,sorry I cant be more specific mate ,SAP may give you a clue ,try PM him.

[SAP]

Cooling Seed

Ideally 3-4*C not lower or they will get frostbite and go rotten. And even if they are at 1*C for half a day they may go rotten.

If you use a refrigerator you need to open the door at least morning and night to change the air. Remember a potato is always a living breathing organism.

And if you wanted to get complicated we try our best to get the cool stores to 95-98% humidity this way you get less weight loss. If you were using a refrigerator put a bowl of water inside the refrigerator aswell this will help increase the humidity.

I hope this helps. I would love to see photo's also of potato plots

[Pond Life]

Lickey, a friend of mine has the only cellar i've seen in Thailand & its not very cool at all, so i dont think you missed out much. Id say the temp is in the area of 25 C with very high humidity, this is in the Mae Hongson hills.

[Lickey]

Thanks Pond Life, i can stop kicking and digging now, dont really want to go to the expense of de-humidifier and AC for a few potatoes,suppose once the heat is in the ground, it basically stays there.

Buying a cheap old fridge i think would run constantly, because the gasses are old and weak.

So how about my latest {crackpot?} idea, Find a resonable sized watertight container, about 1sq ft, pack potatoes in with straw or sand? and lower into holding tank where water is constantly changed for cool from borehole, Spuds would be in the dark and cool, anybody see any drawbacks with this? Thanks Lickey.

[ozzydom]

Thanks Pond Life, i can stop kicking and digging now, dont really want to go to the expense of de-humidifier and AC for a few potatoes,suppose once the heat is in the ground, it basically stays there.

Buying a cheap old fridge i think would run constantly, because the gasses are old and weak.

So how about my latest {crackpot?} idea, Find a resonable sized watertight container, about 1sq ft, pack potatoes in with straw or sand? and lower into holding tank where water is constantly changed for cool from borehole, Spuds would be in the dark and cool, anybody see any drawbacks with this? Thanks Lickey.

Should work Lickey ,its the same principal as "pitting", in the old days we used to dig a hole about 1 cub met ,line it with hessian bags and store your carrots,parsnips etc there, to seal you just put timbers over and cover the top with about a foot of soil, they keep for months.of course thats a different climate to T,land.

[chownah]

Thanks Pond Life, i can stop kicking and digging now, dont really want to go to the expense of de-humidifier and AC for a few potatoes,suppose once the heat is in the ground, it basically stays there.

Buying a cheap old fridge i think would run constantly, because the gasses are old and weak.

So how about my latest {crackpot?} idea, Find a resonable sized watertight container, about 1sq ft, pack potatoes in with straw or sand? and lower into holding tank where water is constantly changed for cool from borehole, Spuds would be in the dark and cool, anybody see any drawbacks with this? Thanks Lickey.

How about making a special refer tank....use 2 metre rings on the outside and 1 metre rings on the inside (concentric)....be sure to install a small pipe at the bottom going form inside the 1 metre rings to the outside of the 2 metre rings for draining off any seepage. run all your irrigation water into the space between the two sets of rings....get the idea?

Chownah

[Lickey]

Good thinking chownah, but as a hobby farmer like yourself i dont really want to keep throwing money into the farm, on the other hand, if i done something like you suggested, i could rent this cool area to B i Law, as a pre-cooler for beer and fantas ect for his mini-mart, its the old story, many people think that by cramming a fridge full, everything will be chilled in an hour, not so, fridge works overtime to cool all this stuff, He crams 40 bottles of warm leo into a chiller cabinet { 1 of 8} and wonders why it aint cold in an hour, and gets a electricity bill of 20,000bht plus a month!!

Sorry folks, bit off topic.

Cheers Lickey..

[Lickey]

Thanks Pond Life, i can stop kicking and digging now, dont really want to go to the expense of de-humidifier and AC for a few potatoes,suppose once the heat is in the ground, it basically stays there.

Buying a cheap old fridge i think would run constantly, because the gasses are old and weak.

So how about my latest {crackpot?} idea, Find a resonable sized watertight container, about 1sq ft, pack potatoes in with straw or sand? and lower into holding tank where water is constantly changed for cool from borehole, Spuds would be in the dark and cool, anybody see any drawbacks with this? Thanks Lickey.

Should work Lickey ,its the same principal as "pitting", in the old days we used to dig a hole about 1 cub met ,line it with hessian bags and store your carrots,parsnips etc there, to seal you just put timbers over and cover the top with about a foot of soil, they keep for months.of course thats a different climate to T,land.

Hi Ozzy, bit like the potatoe clamps in the UK years ago, packed in loads of straw and covered with a tarp spuds would over-winter like this, except for the odd infestation of rats ect, they kept really well, so i reckon as soon as i can find the right spud, im going the way of a cooling sealed container, with sand as well, you mentioned carrotts in your post, have you tried to grow in Thai?

Thanks, Lickey..

[CMexpat]

If anyone gets hooked to growing potatoes, I have a two row planter standing doing nothing. Interested?