It’s time to plant potatoes!

If you’ve never done it before, here’s a step by step guide to planting your own potatoes. And trust me, when you harvest them, they’ll be even better than store bought potatoes.

Step 1: Buy seed potatoes

Purchase seed potatoes from a good company or even your local feed & seed store. Don’t use sprouted potatoes purchased from the store. Seed potatoes are certified to be free of blight. Once potato blight gets in the soil, you won’t get it out. The potatoes purchased from the store can grow potatoes, but they could carry blight, thereby infecting your soil, ruining any future potato crops. So spend a little scratch and get the certified potatoes, it’s worth it.

Step 2: Cut your seed potatoes up

To maximize your crop, you’ll want to cut your seed potatoes up. Cut each potato so that you’re left with chunks that are about 1.5 ounces with one or two eyes per piece. If your potato is about the size of a golf ball, you don’t have to cut it. After the potatoes are cut into pieces, put your pieces, cut side up, and let them dry out for one or two days, until the cut side is dry and leathery. 

Step 3: Plant your potatoes

After they’re dry, dig a trench about 4 inches deep. Place the cut potatoes 8-12 inches apart, cut side down with the eyes facing up. You’ll see sprouts in two to four weeks, depending on soil temperature (potatoes like soil temps at least at 40 degrees F).

Step 4: Hill your potatoes


When the plants are six to eight inches tall, use a garden rake to pull soil around the plants along the row, essentially burying about 80 percent of the plant. Repeat the process in about two or three weeks.

Step 5: Trim the seed pods

Your potato plants will flower and eventually produce tiny little fruit at the top. These contain the actual potato seeds. You can save them if you want, but it’s a lot easier to save seed potatoes from your final harvest. If you don’t want to save the seeds, then cut those off. It’ll direct more energy into those delicious tubers.

Step 6: Harvest your potatoes

Potatoes take anywhere from 16-20 weeks to grow, depending on variety. Once the plants start dying, the potatoes are ready to harvest. Use a garden fork to dig the potatoes out of the ground. Start about a foot away from the plant and pry the root mass out of the ground. Dry the potatoes out of the sun for a couple of days before storing in a cool, dark place. Enjoy!

Learn More At: The Elliott Homestead