WHEN digging potatoes in Roscommon, you need a fork with strong tines.
Moving backwards among the drills, searching for those long-awaited tubers, your wellingtons become indistinct in shape and difficult even to steer properly as the muddy clods which cake all over them come to weigh more than the boots themselves.
Desiree seed potatoes of an inviting healthy pink colour, along with white Orlas, had been sown at the end of May at this patch at Killumod on the Elphin Road. These spuds have been bookended by frosts; although the end of May was later than ideal for planting, ground frost would still have been a risk just six weeks earlier. Removed in early November – and that’s too late – they escaped the worst of winter, but leaving them in the ground until this stage only gives more time for certain slimy devils to ply their trade.
An assistant at the Organic Centre at Rossinver, Co Leitrim advised that the ground dried seaweed they supply is a great potato fertiliser. This rich-smelling brown dust does seem to have been good for the Desirees, but you can't help wondering just how much that pesky Fallopia japonica, or Japanese knotweed, enjoyed it too.
Yes, there’s plenty to contend with in this endeavour, the first items were buried boots and bits of bikes. Perhaps the most invincible foe is that notorious knotweed, which was meticulously removed from the small garden with fork and shovel by this would-be potato-picker – he who has only recently understood that it burrows far below the reach of such ineffectual tools. How then to put manners on it? You find you cannot be too careful with knotweed, but that’s a lesson learned here far too late. It might seem like a great idea to pull off some of the stems which come out along with a section of root, and then put them aside with the intention of burning them in the fire.
But only has your back turned when new knots are sprouting at the spot you carelessly tossed them, burrowing those infernal strings where hands cannot go. Time maybe to get a real digger on the job.
The Invasive Species Ireland project makes clear how bad this invader really is, with its capability of damaging buildings and roads. It states that it must be sprayed during the growing season for the chemical to get right down into the roots. It is a rotten conundrum for a so-far committed organic gardener when it becomes clear that meticulous gloved removal of the sinuous pieces of rhizome is so much of a Sisyphean impossibility. The weedkiller glyphosate, more commonly known as Roundup, is the nuclear option. This is a course repeatedly advised to this gardener by some elders, already well-used to being “smart” in solving such an otherwise backbreaking, energy-guzzling problem.
Knotweed is very fond of water, and considering that its light stems can grow by up to 10cm a day, it obviously consists almost exclusively of it. That this potato/knotweed patch is located alongside a drainage ditch is fine for the spuds, but probably even better for the noxious weed. Any decision to spray would mean the drain might easily provide a route for the chemical off the site.
Dealing with the ever-present risk of phytophthora infestans, or blight, is a seemingly easy aspect – I stress seemingly – of the whole process.
Copper sulphate is mixed with crystals of washing soda and left to brew overnight before soaking all the foliage carefully. This sticky mixture is permitted under organic rules. You won’t get away with any slacking here either – it is best to drench both the facing and underside aspects of the leaves. It having been a sunny summer, the spraying was in the end no gargantuan task, as the bright blue mixture took well to the leaves and adhered a good while. Respraying is usually best, but the general dryness this year helped in keeping the leaves safe from the spores.
The next thing to consider is the multiple unseen underground fauna that nose out the spuds and leave them with an intricate lacework of brown tunnels – a heartbreaking factor when cleaning off a particularly healthy-looking specimen. It’s likely the initial damage here is from wireworms, the larvae of click beetles, whose access points leave a nice little doorway by which slugs can enter to create homely, spacious caverns. Teagasc says the best way to beat the wireworms is not to plant where they are, and to dig spuds early. High time then for me then to find out the addresses of the critters.
We don’t know (yet) where you live.
After you’ve filled your few buckets with spuds, you look forward to scrubbing off the muck, but this is combined with a certain reluctance.
The process will make clear just how many tubers you’ve got. Never mind the later revelation of all the little tunnels.
These few potatoes, requiring such hard work as they have, stand as a pride and joy – or a miserable waste of resources, depending on your own bias. This gardener sees them as both. After being put to the boil the potatoes, few enough as they were, tasted great, though roasting was a better bet considering the number that were a smaller size.
In the context of the strong harvest in this country this year, with 16,000 tonnes of eating potatoes expected to be sent to Russia and Eastern European states according to the Department of Agriculture, you have to ask yourself big questions.
These spuds, after all, also enjoyed that fantastic weather. They benefited from the lesser impact of blight this summer. And, critically, that sticky Roscommon muck.