Nicole Johnsey Burke breaks down three stages of potato harvest. Stage 1: yellowing leaves means only surface potatoes are ready. Stage 2: plant flops over, you can pull everything or pick larger tubers and leave the rest. Stage 3: dead plant and brown stems signal full harvest or wait one to two weeks for better storage.
Chapters
It's potato harvest season. I'm going to show you the 3 stages of potato plant growth so that you get the biggest harvest basket of potatoes this year. The first stage is when the first leaves start to yellow. Don't pull the whole plant at this point. It's still producing tubers, but you can harvest your first new potatoes right off the surface. This is stage 2 when the plant starts to flop over. At this point, you could go ahead and pull the entire plant, Or you could pull some of these bigger potatoes off of it and let a few more keep growing. This one's looking pretty good. This is the third stage when the plant is basically dead. The stems are limp and turning brown. At this point, you could pull the entire plant or let it stay in the garden for 1 to 2 more weeks, and they can store longer. To harvest, you're just going to dig around the entire plant and try to pull it up all at once. Not too bad!