Chits

There's been some confusion, as that last photo really was a potato. (Any similarities to The Sandwich Monster from the AW&BL Trilogy is merely coincidental)

In fact, it was a chitted potato. Our spuds have been chitting for some time, even though I didn't know it. Chitting: the process of pre-sprouting a potato prior to planting in order to maximize vegetative growth once en terre.

Well good to know we did something right! Sure it was an accident (I forgot the potatoes in a paperbag in my trunk for the last 3 weeks), but at least they're off to a strong start!

Planted today in the southern potato field: 'Dark Red Norland' and a few 'Kennebec;' in the northern field we planted 'Purple Majesty' and a few more Kennebec. I also planted a little bit of garlic between the wild garlic and the strawberries, this may have been 'Inchelium Red.' Then some onion 'Yellow Rock' went in to the onion row between Kim Jr and Lil'Kim to replace some that didn't sprout.

Back to the taters: According to the nursery, Kennebecs are intended for "fries and hashbrowns," Purple Majesty is "excellent for baking/frying/chips!," while Norland "has shallow eyes." Hmmm, shallow eyes as a claim to fame? I'll be rooting for this underdog tuber!

We're not sure if today was a good day to plant spuds, but it was sunny so we had to plant something. The good book of western oregon vegetables (referenced in a previous post) is conflicting about its advice about when to plant. One spot says not to even try them before mid-May, another spot says that its an important tradition to plant potatoes on St. Patrick's day. April 4th is a good compromise between those dates, right?