Like many gardeners, I had a real problem growing potatoes this year: blight. Eventually I had no choice but to harvest the crop early and salvage what I could but it was poor, and last year was not great either. Blight thrives when the conditions are mild and wet which recently has been a common feature of our summers.

To me there seems no point in growing your own potatoes and spraying them often, as occurs commercially, with various chemicals. But it is frustrating, and not to say expensive, to buy the tubers, fresh compost and  all the work for the potatoes to succumb to blight.

On GQT today the talk was of saving your own tubers because there may be a shortage in January, presumably because of the poor growing conditions this year. That's not feasible if you have had blight because t is essential that potatoes are only grown from disease free tubers.

It seems to me time to try the variety sold as blight resistant. Sarpo are a possibility, as second or main crop, and hope that the earlies may crop before the blight gets in there. A number of the well know web retailers are offering Sarpo  and I think next year, to produce a decent crop worth the effort, Sarpo are worth a go. This year the blight was so bad that I planted a second late crop, with the intention to carry on growing under glass for Christmas, and they keeled over as well.

The one good thing about this time of year, when the weather keeps you indoors it does give time to think  and plan  what to grow next year....