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What's eating my spuds?

josusa47josusa47 Posts: 3,530
in Fruit & veg
This year I've grown "Cara" in a raised bed.  About one tuber in four has some pest damage, but I never find any creatures inside them, and I never find anything but earthworms in the soil.  So what might be tunnelling into them?  Is there any organic way of preventing this?  I follow a four-bed rotation; the potatoes go in last year's tomato bed. I mulch every autumn with cardboard and home-made compost once the crops are all out.

Posts

  • DovefromaboveDovefromabove Posts: 88,147
    My bet is keeled slugs. 

    Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.





  • SkandiSkandi Posts: 1,723
    Tiny round holes will be wire worm, slightly larger round or oddly shaped holes will be slugs as Dove says, large holes/hollow potatoes are often voles. If you can post a picture of a nibbled potato that would help.
  • AstroAstro Posts: 433
    I grew Cara over the allotment for a couple of years alongside Charlotte which I continue to do and the Cara were like Swiss cheese.  Keeled slugs as DFA mentioned were often inside them. The Charlotte usually have minimal damage unless I leave them in the ground too long. 
  • NollieNollie Posts: 7,529
    Potatoes following on from tomatoes may not help, they are closely related as both are from the solanaceae family and attract the same pests and diseases, so ideally they should be separated by something else in the rotation plan.
    Mountainous Northern Catalunya, Spain. Hot summers, cold winters.
  • josusa47josusa47 Posts: 3,530
    Thanks everyone.  @Nollie, would it be better to have the spuds following the beans, or the roots?  (No-one eats greens in my house.)   And would the remainder of this year's crop keep better in the the ground or in the garage?
  • NollieNollie Posts: 7,529
    I think I would follow your spuds with the beans, but anything is better than following one solanaceae with another. I tend to lift and store any spare spuds in dry compost in the garage, but only because they can bake if left in the ground here, so it depends on your weather! 
    Mountainous Northern Catalunya, Spain. Hot summers, cold winters.
  • DovefromaboveDovefromabove Posts: 88,147
    I would lift the potatoes, dry them off and store inside ... potatoes in the ground are dinnerparty time for slugs this weather. 

    Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.





  • NollieNollie Posts: 7,529
    Good point, Dove. I don’t have slugs. I always write that with trepidation as I’m sure they will find me one day 😱 
    Mountainous Northern Catalunya, Spain. Hot summers, cold winters.
  • josusa47josusa47 Posts: 3,530
    edited October 2020
    I dug up the last of the potatoes after lunch and found lots of sandy-coloured centipedes, with a pair of legs per segment.  Mostly running around in the soil, but one was half in and half out of a potato, and not looking the least bit penitent.  "Ah" thought I, "these must be the wireworms."  But no.  I googled wireworms and they are insect larvae, therefore have only six legs.  Lots of advice online about controlling wireworms, but I seem to have something different.
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