Aki jaga

[johnElarue]

Anyone ever done the aki-jaga?

I just reserved some hana-shibetsu from http://www.hokusonotane.co.jp/SHOP/261994/324003/list.html

the andes red, looked good but passed on them.

What's the difference tween spring and autumn spuds anyhow? (don't say the name)

[julian s]

Anyone ever done the aki-jaga?

the andes red, looked good but passed on them.

What's the difference tween spring and autumn spuds anyhow? (don't say the name)

I've got a trial run of Andes Red and Red Moon. Both are doing well (went in in May). I've held some back to plant in September.

Here are the Andes Red:

http://a.imageshack.us/img215/5350/img0568u.jpg (http://img215.imageshack.us/i/img0568u.jpg/)

And the Red Moon:

http://a.imageshack.us/img692/9134/img0569lt.jpg (http://img692.imageshack.us/i/img0569lt.jpg/)

I'll let you know how they're turned out in a few weeks when I've pulled 'em up.

And do you mean the difference between 'earlies' and 'maincrop'? Earlies take around 90 days to maturity (tho' ya get the first earlies at 75 and second earlies at 110), maincrop take 160. Maincrops are the ones you can store, I believe.

[johnElarue]

Wow, those red moons look great Julian, nice pic.

Thanks for the info. I didn't mean earlies or maincrop. I thought maybe aki jaga were like onions, "determinate" or something, depending on your latitude. So maybe any old spud can be planted in autumn as well as spring?

My earlies are whatever I pull up first, my mains are whatever lives longer than that, and the main storage are whatever I throw under the house and make it till March :p shows how much I know, which is why I don't do onions. None of this makes any sense does it.

[kirinclassic]

John, julian,

Dunno much about aki jaga per se, but (just to add to the confuddlement) what I have heard is:

Your spring potato varieties are for eating, planting them in the fall is not so good.

Your autumn-planted spuds can be eaten, but also used for seed potatoes in the spring. But then the following harvest, this lot must be eaten, not re-planted. Which doesn't really make much sense, but there you go.

Cheers,

KC

[johnElarue]

hmmmmm.....thanks KC. I just bought a kilo of barely edible spuds that need to be sown, harvested and re-planted again? hmmppfff, like buying bread at the supermarket, coming home and biting into it and not realizing it's stuffed with some awful , sweet , doesn't-belong-on-bread condiment. Don't throw those old sprouting spuds away folks. Package them up and sell em on e-bay as aki-jaga. But seriously, thanks and we'll see how it goes.

[myhobbyis]

And do you mean the difference between 'earlies' and 'maincrop'? Earlies take around 90 days to maturity (tho' ya get the first earlies at 75 and second earlies at 110), maincrop take 160. Maincrops are the ones you can store, I believe.


Yeah, that's what I thought.

From a culinary perspective on it:

The spring crop has a shorter growing time so includes new potatoes, little potatoes with soft skins for boiling and serving with mint and butter.

The main crop has a longer growing time so it's going to include late harvested whoppers for baking in the Autumn.

That's the theory at least.

BTW wish there were more varieties of pots in Japan to play with. There have been these new varieties on the shelf but it's always the gimmick of some weird colour rather than taste and usefulness.

[julian s]

Well, here are the results of my red potato adventure.

The Andes. I had 4 plants, planted on May 6th. I cut them back about two weeks ago, to just 5cm or so and harvested yesterday. Grand total: 2320g. Biggest spud coming in at 210g.

http://img829.imageshack.us/img829/461/img0840j.jpg (http://img829.imageshack.us/i/img0840j.jpg/)

Not bad. I've not tasted them yet, mind you.

The Red Moon. Same as Andes, 4 plants went in on May 6th. Splendid leafy growth (see photo in earlier post). Didn't cut them back when I did the Andes. Harvested yesterday.......Grand total: a pathetic 610g. Most of the spuds were rather malformed and the biggest was only 122g. Pah.

Don't know what went wrong there. Same soil, same row, same weather, same watering......

[johnElarue]

Thanks for the update julian,

They look pretty good from here, too bad they didn't produce a little more for you though. It's all a learning experience though, and tasty at that. Got my hanashibetsu seed potatoes in the mail and will be putting them in the ground sometime in September.

[Gandalf]

I've got two varieties of autumn potato ready to plant (not sure what they were - whatever the local GooDay had on sale).

I did three varieties of potato in spring, including Andes Red, which was quite successful. Mine seemed to go yellow and die down before the neighbours did, although Andes Red stayed looking healthy the longest time. Yields on all were quite good - lots of small new potatoes though, no biggies, but it worked out to something like 4kg per m2 which I understand is typical.

I'll keep you informed of the progress on the Autumn potatoes... might plant them today as the weather has finally dropped below "hell's sauna" on the thermometer...

[johnElarue]

Hope all goes well with your taters Gandalf. 75% of mine were wiped out by boars and or deer recently. They ate the tiny spuds but left the greens and roots, so I just stuck 'em back in and they seem to be hanging in there.

[johnElarue]

let's update that to 90% wiped out, the back fence looks like the Mexican-American border, porous. Frickin frackin hogs, I'm contemplating a spear hunt, anyone up for it?

[KenElwood]

let's update that to 90% wiped out.
Damn ! Really sorry, Johne. If I can, I'm inclined to help.

ken

[dataGecko]

Oh no, sounds bad JohnE. I won't complain about possums any more!! I am going to ensure that when I buy a place in Japan, I have a fund kept aside for good strong fencing! Sounds like its not really optional.

[Gandalf]

Hey, my potatoes are doing fine at the moment. Mostly up and growing well - maybe 1ft high. No damage other than a few small holes, probably caterpillars, but potato leaves aren't really good eating, so not to bad...

The fence depends on where you are. In an area like mine the worst thing to worry about are birds, bugs, and the occasional snake. If you are more remote and up in the mountains then you are going to encounter the monkeys, wild boars, and things which are more troublesome.

[julian s]

let's update that to 90% wiped out,

Jeez, johne sorry to hear that. You must be so fed up.

I have lost the majority of my promising black-eyed bean crop to some rampaging shield beetles. I'd guess 90% of the pods are infested with their maggots.

Meanwhile, I planted a few more potatoes a month or so ago (Andes), but only two or three are beginning to show any signs of growth. Ho hum.

Courgettes/zucchini though, back on form just when I was about to pull the buggers up. Yippee! Gotta love those yellow courgettes.

[Gandalf]

OK, last Sunday I pulled one potato plant to see how they were going. I got 900g of good looking potatoes off the one bush! I'm considering digging up the rest now as the tops are starting to look a little wilted... Will post a pic of the final harvest when it happens.
Has anyone else had a good harvest?

[johnElarue]

Great work Gandalf, cheers to you

As for me decimated by critters haha

[Gandalf]

I dug up another 5 today. This gave me just under 2kg, from 5 plants - so not as good as the first one, but not bad. Attached is a picture as proof! This is yielding close to 4kg/m2 which is about the target I'd say.
This is only half the bed, as I decided to leave the others to grow a bit more - there are a few small potatoes that I think could develop better given a bit more time.

[Gandalf]

More pics:
Beautiful new aki jaga!

Bit of a history lesson - one of the reasons the potato became so popular in England and Ireland was that suddenly here was a staple crop that could yield 4kg/m2 using methods which gave only 1/2 to 1kg/m2 for wheat or oats! So, the poor peasant farmer with limited land could grow a lot more carbohydratey, stomach filling stuff. AND, it was simple to cook, unlike grains which needed to be threshed, milled, and finally baked into bread. The final killer was that potatoes could be kept in the ground, so a landlord coming around to tax your produce wouldn't necessarily know that there were any potatoes around, whereas wheat and the like was pretty obvious and easily taxed.
It is possible nowdays to get 4kg/m2 from wheat, but only by pumping so much fertilizer and pesticide into it that it is actually uneconomical to do so... I believe the best organic wheat yields are around 2kg/m2... (but I could be wrong)

[julian s]

Wow, they're looking great, gandi. Are these the ones you put in back in early September? Pretty quick work.

Interesting history lesson too. More please!

I have some more Andes coming along, but they went in much later (too late?) and are leaving up nicely but nowhere near harvestable yet. I have been diligent and piled more earth over them the other day.

[Gandalf]

Yes, they are the ones planted back in September. I was impressed with their speed too!

[johnElarue]

I think you're onto something there Gandalf,

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-11864290

[Gandalf]

Just to finish up my Aki Jaga tale - I think I got about another 5kg or so out of these... Overall the crop was VERY successful and the yields per m2 increased as I left the crop to mature fully - last batch (from the same type and area as the photo above) flattened the scale and was probably approaching 3kg. I got a couple of really big ones too, including "pound potato" - a 440 gram monster which I made into very nice long chips!
I'll definitely be doing them again this year and recommend everyone to give them a go.
Now I see Gooday already has spring potatoes in again, so the cycle starts again...