Potatoes stalks/stems

I'm sure there is some proper Technical name .. but just harvested 20 sq m of potatoes .... the foliage had all died back leaving brown stems.
Great crop - no issues there.

2 questions -

# can I compost these stems OK ... neighbour said no, burn them to prevent potato blight

# each plant also produced loads of green tomato like fruit ... haven't put these in compost as assume they have seeds, but should i ?

 

Hello Sargan.
Not quite sure of the answer to all of your question.
Those brown stems - did the foliage just die naturally or did your potatoes have blight ?
If they had blight then don't compost them - you would only be saving it up.
Those little potato apples - are highly poisonous and I would dispose of them.
I don't compost anything from potatoes - rotten ones, skins, roots, anything.
The stuff all grows and volunteer potatoes come up anywhere the compost has been put.
Glad you got such a good crop.
I got a great crop of Orla from buckets - very early.
And Pink Fir Apple in a deep bed gave a great crop - still eating them from the ground.

 

bury them in your runner bean trench, Blight is an airbourne fungus and wont be on your stems if buried in trenches,

 

I have read that you can compost the foliage but not the fruits of both potato and tomato plants that have had blight.

 

Dont compost the spuds they will grow and grow for years and u will never get rid of them

 

No blight ... just at end of August green foliage died back to brown 'straw' ... couple of barrowloads of it.

I had not previously composted potatoes peelings, but several knowledgeable sites advise YES to peelings.

 

t was sites such as Royal Horticultural Society and Centre for Alternative Technology .............but I am keen to learn

 

It depends what they mean by composting.

If you just pile kitchen waste in a heap week after week then you'll get spuds coming up from it & diseases carried thru.

If you make a heap all in one go, with alternate layers of wet & dry materials, sprinkle it with a high nitrogen activator such as badger wee & then cover it, then it will get hot enough to kill everything off.

It helps to turn it to get more air in for the bacteria.

 

I just burn potato tops, not worth the problems of composting.

 

Oh yeah,

Correct name for them is "Haulms"

 

Oh dont get technical on me Ziggy

 

:hehe: He did ask though

 

I now know they are called Haulms

I do build compost piles over a couple of weeks ... with alternate layers ... but admit to not having any 'badger pee'

 

If you can keep the ingredients in separate piles & then lob it all together at once you will achieve critical mass better. Once it has gone nuclear( you test by sticking a metal rod into the middle, when its too hot to touch then its turned on )
It will rot down very quickly. As I said, turning it gets air into the middle to keep the bacteria going.

If you can't catch a badger then watered down homo sapiens wee will work just as good.

I knew someone who used to work the council composting site, they turned it all with JCBs & the process only took a matter of weeks. The site created its own micro climate due to the heat coming off the compost. The site was also covered with tomato & marijuanna plants as these seeds could survive the heat of composting.