Kennebec Potato - 2 LB Bag

For a potato that's been around since World War II, Kennebec sure gets a lot of attention and praise! The choice of fine restaurants and gourmet cooks everywhere, it's also the home gardener's favorite for early, generous crops that taste delicious and store well. Give it a try this season and we predict it will become your go-to tater, too!

Kennebec is a large, oval potato with a thin tan skin (easy to peel), few pockmarks or craters, and firm, dense white flesh. It is good for baking, chipping, mashing, scalloping, and boiling. Superbly disease-resistant (it was developed by the USDA), it adapts to gardens in all climates and conditions across the U.S., and was originally selected in Maine. In other words, this is a homegrown potato that anyone can grow and everyone will love!

Finishing earlier than most others, Kennebec also delivers a few extra spuds in every harvest, too. Possibly this is because of its terrific disease-fighting capabilities, which keeps the plants healthy and highly productive. Kennebec is resistant to potato leafroll virus, late blight, black leg, fusarium (dry rot), phoma rot, potato wart, and two types of potato virus. You just can't beat it for ease of care and successful crops every time!

Expect these plants to reach just 8 inches high but spread 18 to 24 inches wide in fertile, well-worked, well-drained soil. Like all Potatoes, Kennebec fares best in sandy, enriched soil, but if you have heavy or clay soil, just used a raised bed or plant the tubers more shallowly, mulching them well with straw. Here's how to grow them:

If your soil is normal to sandy, work in some gypsum and Epsom salts before planting, then set the tubers 3 or 4 inches deep and about a foot apart. (If your soil is heavier, plant more shallowly and rely on mulch rather than soil for coverage.) Potato tubers should be planted in early spring, at the same time as you sow your green peas. If a late frost threatens, just toss a few inches of straw or other mulch over the young plants, and chances are they'll be fine.

When the shoots emerge, you may want to sow some bush beans alongside the young plants -- they'll keep the bugs down! Basil and Summer Savory are also fine companions that keep insects at bay -- we usually just wait to see which Potatoes didn't sprout, and fill in the gaps with these helpful herbs! (Of course, Marigold, friend to all vegetables for its ability to destroy more nematodes than commercial repellents, is always a beautiful choice too!)

Potatoes tend to grow their fruit right under the soil, and over time the tubers may stick out above the soil line. This can cause greening, which ruins the flavor (and adds toxins to the Potato), so watch your plants and add more soil, straw, or peat moss as necessary to keep the taters under wraps! The plants may also bloom, and small, hard green fruits will appear when the flowers pass. Don't be tempted to harvest them -- they're toxic!

When it's time to harvest, begin at the outer edges of each plant and work your way in. You want to gently turn over the soil using a garden fork or blunt-edged spade, to avoid cutting into the potatoes. Store the spuds, unwashed and not touching one another, in a totally dark, cool place, where they'll last for several weeks. (You can eat them after they've sprouted; just cut away the inedible sprout and its eye.) Once you've harvested the crop from end to end, begin in a new spot and work your way through it from a different direction. You'll be amazed at how many spuds you missed the first time!

This bag of tubers plants 20 to 25 feet of row. Make Kennebec part of your permanent vegetable garden -- try it this season!

Potato Germination Information

• Best sown indoors at a temperature of 68-86° and at a depth of 4 times the size of the seeds
• They will germinate in 10-15 days
• They are not often grown from seed, unless they are a variety that is true from seed
• They are generally grown from pieces cut from certified “Seed Potatoes"
• Each 11/2 inch square piece should contain at least one eye
• Plant the pieces 2-4 inches deep
• Plant them 2 weeks before last frost and look for sprouts in 2 weeks
• When sowing seed outdoors, we recommend a maximum planting depth of 4X the width of the seed

This spreading annual vine is grown for its edible tubers that form underground on the roots. They are rounded or oblong and colored white, red, or purple. Dig the small “new” potatoes when the tops begin to flower; dig the full sized potatoes 2 weeks after frost has blackened the stems. In warm southern areas the plants go dormant before frost, so harvest the tubers when the plants turn yellow

Superior Germination Through Superior Science

First of all, we have humidity- and temperature-controlled storage, and we never treat any of our seeds with chemicals or pesticides. Nor do we ever sell GMO's (genetically modified seeds), so you always know the products you're buying from us are natural as well as safe for you and the environment.

Superior Standards - University Inspected

Hand Packed By Experienced Technicians

When packing our seeds, the majority are actually done by hand (with extreme care!), and we often over-pack them, so you're receiving more than the stated quantity.

The Park Seed Gold Standard

Heirloom Seeds are open-pollinated -- they are not hybrids. You can gather and save heirloom seed from year to year and they will grow true to type every year, so they can be passed down through generations. To be considered an heirloom, a variety would have to be at least from the 1940's and 3 generations old (many varieties are much older -- some 100 years or more!).

Hybrid seed are the product of cross-pollination between 2 different parent plants, resulting in a new plant/seed that is different from the parents. Unlike Heirloom seed, hybrid seed need to be re-purchased new every year (and not saved). They usually will not grow true to type if you save them, but will revert to one of the parents they were crossed with and most likely look/taste different in some way.