Planting Potatoes

March 11, 1937  Mama and I went to Meade to get seed oats.  In the afternoon Mary and I planted potatoes.  John sowed oats.  In the evening John F. Reimers were here.

Cornelius tried to plant potatoes close to March 17 because that was St. Patrick’s Day and the Irish were associated with potatoes.  It did not have to be exactly on the 17^th because it depended on the weather and their schedule.  They would buy one hundred pounds of seed potatoes at the grocery store and cut them into pieces with an eye that would sprout.  This would provide enough potatoes for the family for the whole year, although if they did run short of potatoes in spring, they would eat more noodles instead because that was the most expensive time of year to buy potatoes. 

The general rule of thumb is that you should get ten pounds of potatoes for every pound that you plant.  But Jake Siemens always said that in Kansas you need to plant a pound of seed potatoes to get a pound of potatoes.