The Little River news. (Ashdown, Little River County, Ark.) 1897-current, 1918-11-30
POTATOES ROT BY
IMPROPER STORAGE
Keep Your Sweet Potatoes To
Best Advantage.

BY J. S. Knox, Horticulturist, Exten-
sion Division, e. of A.
Because of improper storage many
of our farmers lost their whole crop
of sweet potatoes this past winter.
fact that many bushels OF rotten po-
! tatoes can be seen lying in the bitches
near the farm homes. With our coun-
try at war and possibility Of food
/ shortage facing us for the coming Win
| ter, it is necessary that every possible
effort be made to stop this unneces-
sary waste of this important food
crop. In some cases this past winter
individual farmers lost enough sweet
potatoes to have paid for a small stor-
age house of 500 bushels capacity.
Several of the farmers who built stor-
age houses last fall have written the
Agricultural Extension Division, stat
ing that they had from 800 to 500
bushels Of seed potatoes for sale.
These sold easily for 50 per bushel and
one farmer said he could easily have
sold 1000 bushels at that price If he
| had grown the potatoes and stored
them.
1t matters not whether you are a
large grower of sweet potatoes Or
whether you have only an acre for
home use, a small storage house of
from 200 to 800 bushels capacity will
easily pay for itself in a few years.
It is true that, if properly cared for,
potatoes can be stored successfully in
small quantities in the bank or pit,
but it is SO hard to get this work done
exactly right for all conditions of
weather that it is considered by all
authorities to be far better to build
storage house where conditions such
as temperature, moisture, ETC., can be
regulated as desired.
The storage house alone will not in
we must also observe carefully the fol
lowing factors: CD At the time of
harvest use every possible care to
avoid the bruising of the potatoes.
Throwing potatoes to a pile across
several rows or other rough treatment
is sure to break the skins on them in
such a way as to make the entrance
Of disease germs much easier. Early
this spring the writer was in storage
house where some 10000 bushels OF
sweet potatoes had been stored over
winter. The storage man had han
died all of his crop carefully eXcep.
those in one bip-with these he had
used no special care to prevent brcis-
ing. Potatoes in this bin had at least
one-fourth OF tie potatoes with decay,
while in tie other bins not i per cert
were decaying. They had all been in
the same storage house under exactly
the same corditions. CD Do not store
diseased potatoes. If any cigns Of dis
ease can be seen at digging time it IS
far better to feed these potatoes to
hogs or even throw them away than
to place in storage with good potatoes.
They will not only rot Themselves
but will cause others to rot. 60 Soc
that the storage house is properly
cleaned out and disinfected before
placing a new crop Of potatoes in stor-
age. Use a strong formalin solution
for this purpose and he sure that the
work is done thoroughly. This should
be done some time in advance of the
storage season. az The temperature
of the storage house should be at so
to 85 degrees T. VIXEN the potatoes are
placed in storage end held as near this
temperature rs possible until the pota-
toes are properly cured. At the end
OF this time the temperature should be
allowed to drop to so to SO degrees T.
and held. about this point for the re-
mainder of the season. 90 The ven
tilation of the building must be good,
| at least sufficient to carry off the
| moisture as it comes from the pota.
| toes 1t is best to make the venti-
! lators large, then if only a small circu-
lation is desired the ventilators can
be partly closed CO. Do not make the
bins too large. A bin that ISL feet by
feet by 4 feet is very good size
and has given very general satisfac-
ton over the State.
Build a storage house. Write
the Agricultural Extension Divi-
! sion, Old Statehouse, Little Rock, Ark,
| for information and plans.
! sas