Seed potato supplies may be lower this year, so there’s no time to waste

MANY gardeners are finding Covid 19 is restricting their choice of seed potatoes this year. But we’ll still get a good crop when buying, and then chitting, certified seed potatoes for April planting.

Twenty five years ago, well-known tattie guru, Alan Romans, and I organised Scotland’s first seed potato day. At this and later events run by Borders Organic Gardeners, over 100 different potato varieties were sold by the tuber.

Sadly, for the first time, there will be no Borders potato day this year or any of the other smaller events that have since grown up. So thousands of tattie growers must look elsewhere.

Garden centres and mail order suppliers offer a much more restricted choice, usually around 30 varieties. And these potatoes are sold in 1kg and 2kg bags, 10-20 tubers, not by the individual tuber as at potato days. A few companies do offer ‘collection packs’ containing, say, 3 tubers of each of 3 varieties.

It looks as if seed potato supplies are lower than usual this year, because when looking at mail order websites, I see some varieties are already sold out. So get your tatties now!

However restricted the choice becomes, leading potato expert, John Marshall, is urging gardeners to only buy certified seed potatoes.

“Don’t be tempted to use supermarket table potatoes no matter how good they look,” he says.

We were discussing the importance of buying and growing safe seed potatoes and exploring how the present certification system works.

SASA, Science and Advice for Scottish Agriculture, began the certification process in 1910 by examining varietal purity and looking for evidence of fungal

Visit askorganic.co. uk. Follow Dave on Twitter @boddave

Getting the right seed potatoes is key