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Vegetable Gardening

Where to get seed potatoes in CA?

alrightypewriter

13 years ago

I've seen seed potatoes online but no one will ship to California. I'm not sure where to find them at a brick and mortar store. I live in Los Angeles, if anyone can recommend a place.

Could I just use organic potatoes from the grocery store? Can I do the same for sweet potatoes?

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Comments (9)

sandhill_farms
13 years ago
I'm curious as to why no one will ship seed potatoes to California. Do they give a reason?

Greg
Southern Nevada
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cabrita
13 years ago
Yes and Yes. When we can't find starts we use organic potatoes from Trader joes. Many of them have sprouted quite well. Sweet potatoes are also very easy to start from slips that you get just planting a grocery store root or holding it over water with toothpicks. Wrong time to plant sweet potatoes in LA though. Good time for Irish type potatoes.
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Hmm. Just found this section, all good to know. Sulfur - interesting, grocery vs certified, light or no light, etc. I purchased some seed potatoes this year from WalMart not good results. My solution with reasonable results is buy a bag of potatoes (5lbs more than I can use for cooking) then dump them out of bag into a serving tray I keep in kitchen at end of island. When some start to sprout I use them for cooking but peel thickly, allow peelings to dry for a day then plant-they grow!! Had a fire ant problem this year so I pulled mulch back and spread diatomaceous earth then recovered with mulch, seemed to work ants gone. This continuous planting works for me in Central Florida because of climate, I also replant some of the potatoes that are produced from the plants produced from peelings. Have noticed increase in grubs in my raised beds will be treating them with milky spore powder this year. I don't know where I heard or read that regular grocery stores potatoes may be treated to prevent sprouting so I wash all then dry before spreading on the tray.
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The UFL chart has the last date for central as Feburary and the southern as January. I would give it a shot if you are in the northern part of 10A, as long as you have spare room to experiment. I was shopping for potato seed last fall and found that the big outfits have no idea when we should plant. They all want to ship way to late and they are not too good at special order shipping. I found left over 2012 seed that was available for immediate shipment from Natural Gardening. They were clearing them, so those are all gone now. I kept them in the fridg until last week. I will plant next week if my foot heals up enough to dig. They are starting to sprout quite nicely. I think that you could hold the seed until you fall planting time, but your fridg is meant for short term food storage rather than long term seed holding. They may not make it to September. You might try an internet search for seed potato and look up some smaller organic outfits. You might get them to ship early, or hold back some seed for fall planting. I've had fantastic luck dealing with organic family farms. They have been genuinely interested in the oddball planting times we have this far South. Larry
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Dan _Staley (5b Sunset 2B AHS 7)
13 years ago
Don't HD and Lois carry them in spring in CA? I haven't lived there in a few years now, so don't remember. Surely a decent nursery will have them in spring. Plan C will be a farmer's market.

And I do miss those bags of three-color new potatoes that TJs carries (or used to).

Dan
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farmerdilla
13 years ago
Irish potatoes are subject to lots of diseases. Certification programs help to prevent the spread of these diseases. Certification standards significantly raises the cost. California has a rigorous certification program, which many non California producers cannot or can not afford to meet.
As near as I can tell, the Potato Garden http://www.potatogarden.com/ ships Colorado certified seed to California. California suppliers include Peaceful Valley Farm and Garden Supply, Baker Creek (Petaluma store), California Oregon Seed (Oakdale) Common Ground (Palo Alto)

Here is a link that might be useful: California Certified Irish potatoes.
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Dan _Staley (5b Sunset 2B AHS 7)
13 years ago
Oh, yes, I forgot to mention Phytophthora while babbling...

Dan
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alrightypewriter
Original Author
13 years ago
Thanks everyone for the info. I don't have room for more plants right now I was just curious for future reference.

I'll check out the potato garden that farmerdilla suggested. Will also try to grow from organic grocery store potatoes when the time is right.

Sandhill, I'm not sure what the exact reasons are for not shipping to CA but my hunch is that it's for agricultural safety. I know you can't even come back into the state if you drive without going through some checkpoints where they ask you if you have any fruits or veggies.
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oregonwoodsmoke
13 years ago
I don't know about California, but potato starts around here are available in the spring at all the feed stores, most of the hardware stores, and any farm and ranch supply store.

Just about any store that sells canning supplies will have seed potatoes. Lowes and Home Depot sell them here.

Potatoes have a lot of serious diseases and since the tuber is grown in the dirt, they are soil-born diseases and probably not something you'd want to inoculate your soil with.

I would recommend that you use certified seed potatoes.
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sandhill_farms
13 years ago
"I would recommend that you use certified seed potatoes."

I'll second this. Peaceful Valley is in California so you should have no problem ordering from them. Here's a link...

Here is a link that might be useful: Peaceful Valley
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promethean_spark
13 years ago
Costco carries bags of small red, yellow and purple potatoes, which might be comparable to the trader joes bags of potatoes. I got one just to try growing purple potatoes (they're purple on the inside too!). Don't know if they'll grow yet.

BTW, the purple potatoes were the least tasty of the three in a side-by-side taste test.
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