Monty Don warns never eat the green part of potatoes
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Gardening expert, and lead host of Gardeners’ World Monty Don has shared his tips for gardening in February. The plant pro shares hacks and jobs on his blog each month. On this month’s blog post, Monty shared a handy “egg box” trick for chitting potatoes.
Monty said potatoes grow from sprouts that emerge in spring from tubers.
He continued: “We are all familiar with transparent sprouts emerging from potatoes stored in the dark at this time of year.
“But if seed potatoes are exposed to light now the new sprouts will be knobbly and dark green.
“When these ‘chitted’ potatoes are planted they are primed to grow away extra quickly.”
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Monty said chitting is “especially beneficial” for early or maincrop varieties of potato.
These varieties are more sensitive to blight.
“Place the seed potatoes in a seed tray or egg box and put somewhere bright, cool but frost free,” Monty added.
“The knobbly shoots will start to appear after a few weeks and can then be left until the soil is warm enough for planting.”
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Chitting reduces the amount of time gardeners will have to wait before the potatoes crop.
This means chitting is perfect for impatient gardeners.
Chitting should also ensure that there is a better potato harvest later on.
The chitting process can start around six weeks before gardeners plan to plant potatoes.
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For some people, that may be now while for others that could be next month.
Once the varieties have been chitted, gardeners can plant all the potatoes at the same time.
However, it’s important to label up where the different varieties have been planted as they will all need to be harvested at different times.
Gardeners don’t need to chit potatoes to get a good crop.
But, if potatoes start to sprout, it may be a better solution.
To increase your crop, gardeners can cut seed potatoes in half before planting.
Potatoes grow best in well-drained sandy soil.
Poorly drained soil is more likely to produce diseased tubers.
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