Kitchen Garden Forum

my allotment society is selling seed potatoes in 5,7 and 14lb bags or 2.5kg. last year it said on the order form approx how many seeds per weight so i could calculate how much i needed, this year they haven't so i haven't a clue how much to order. could someone please advise me on approx how many first earlies and how many maincrop seeds for these weights.

my allotment is divided into 2X3m beds so i am going to have one or each main and early.

i also have the same problem with onoins, they are being sold by the 1/2lb and i have no idea how much to order to fill a 2X3m bed.

any advice much appreciated

This is always tricky as it depends how big the onion sets or seed potatoes are. I guess this is why they have stopped advising on how many pero kilo etc. Can you order the same weight as last year and if the seed potatoes are large cut them into pieces as long as you have an eye on each piece.

Sorry, Meow, not really an answer, but that is one reason why I like to order my potatoes from Thompson and Morgan because they list their potato varieties in the number of tubers, e.g. 5, 10 and 20. I know, for instance, that our allotment rows are "20 tubers long" so I can order appropriately. I think that 1.5kg are very roughly 20 tubers.

According the the organic gardening catalogue, 1.5 kg is approximately 15 tubers, depending on size/variety. In my experience it is often more, getting up to 20 sometimes.

Hello Meow
These figures seem about right to me. I always like to get quite a few more tubers than I actually need because bags can contain tubers in a mixture of sizes and conditions. Anything less than perfect is not worth bothering with when you're planting on a small scale.

John

One of the first vegetable growing books I bought was "Growing Vegetables" by David Pople, who was an Assistant Editor of "Popular Gardening" and "Home Gardener", published 1968 and I still go back to it from time to time. Here is what it says on this subject:
Potatoes - 7 tubers to the pound, Earlies (First and Second) 1' apart rows 2' apart (I would put the Seconds a bit further apart), Maincrop 15" apart rows 30" apart.
Onions - size is important since small sets produce the best onions, aim to get 200 to 250 sets in a pound, plant in rows 1' apart spaced at 4" to 6".

thanks so much for all your advice, its a massive help. i can now crack on with ordering. x