My s.o. decides he wants to experiment. We had a potato that was starting to sprout, and he decides to try to root it. (I’ve rooted many a plant, but it never occurred to me to try a potato.) Anyway, he cuts a small slice off (on the opposite end if where the sprouts have started), and sits it in a small glass with the sliced part in the water (with a few toothpicks stuck in it to hold it up on the edge of the glass). That was a month ago. It now has roots. It is sitting on our window sill with all these roots, and the sprouts on top are getting bigger and bigger. I need to plant it. How do I plant it?
Of course, s.o. has lost interest and it’s up to me to figure out what to do with his “experiment” – although he’d probably be annoyed if I trashed it. I don’t mind really – I like taking care of things…but,
my gardening experience consists of rooting cuttings of common house plants and then putting them in soil and watering. Potatoes grow underground, right? Do I plant the whole thing in a pot, covering it with soil? What about those sprouts - what the hell are they anyway? Do I bury them too, or cut them off, or what?
I certainly don’t expect to grow a crop of potatoes, but is this “experiment” going to result in a decorative plant or what? (By the way, we’re in an apartment with a balcony, so planting of anything has to be in a pot.)
plant the potato & its roots in the soil, leave the leaves/sprouts above the soil. Plant where it will get a fair amount of sun and water regularly. I had potato plants for a while, at my old house, they make nice vines that you can “train” up a lattice or such. Decent looking plant.
and yes, you can plant it in a pot, just not too small- maybe a 10-12" diameter pot. I managed to keep tons of plants alive on my balcony, even in Las Vegas summer heat.
Usually, potatoes are planted by cutting up the spud into chunks, each one with an “eye.” However, in hard times, growers planted just pieces of the skin, and they ate the spud. It reportedly worked as well. The plant didn’t seem to care which side was up.
There are vegetables that taste much better fresh from your own garden, and those are the ones I grow. Others, such as green beans and potatoes, are just as good from the grocery, so I let the pros raise them.
Potato(e)s are easy to grow.
Very easy to grow.
In fact, too easy to grow.
Do not plant this thing in a place where you intend to have anything else grow.
Potato(e)s will always grow there…unless you replace 1 cubic mile of soil surrounding the original plant.
This is an exaggeration.
But not by much.
The plant has a root system with starchy chunks throughout (called potatoes). To get rid of the plant, you gotta get rid of ALL the chunks. Or else each will spawn its own plant.