My plan would be this:

order all the cultivars I want this year (spend a fortune, since no one source has them all)

grow enough so that I've got 5 lbs of each one specifically for seed.

plant the seed potato plants closer together than normal so that I get small ones that I can plant whole, rather than having to cut them up (I've read this reduces seed piece decay)

keep an eye out for disease, especially late blight, and if it comes, abandon the project for that year.

Any other suggestions, warnings, etc.?

I figure if my neighbors have been using their own seed potatoes for 60 or 100 years, I may as well give it a try.

A cheaper (and easier) alternative, if you aren't real picky about varieties and even that is improving, is to just buy grocery store potatoes and plant them. That way all the storage problems are the commercial growers, not yours.

Just something to consider.

Dave

Last fall I pre-planted some of my seed potatoes a bit deeper than spring planting, sprinkled with scads of cayenne to hopefully deter the rodents, and covered with lots of mulch. If it ever stops snowing and warms up, I'll rake off most of the mulch. I'm just experimenting to see what works.

Dave -- We do have a root cellar that stays between 40 and 50 degrees and no light, so our eating storage potatoes last until the next early potatoes are in, in June or so. It's the one non storage type (Yukon Red Gold) that will be a challenge -- I was thinking maybe borrow a corner of a friend's North Carolina coastal garden, plant in November, dig up in early April, plant in my zone 5 in
mid April. It's seeing that lots of people do plant grocery store potatoes that made me think that the whole "certified seed" thing is overkill. Problem with that for us, is we're ridiculously picky about varieties -- though I prefer to think of it as being potato connoisseurs. :)

sweetquietplace -- what is the purpose of the sulfur?

Thanks, all!

But I do agree that sulfur dusting is very beneficial as it is both anti-fungal and anti-bacterial.

Dave

Fedco has great taters to start with. I like Augusta Gold, Rose Finn Apple, Purple Viking and Magic Molly. A good russet type is recommended too because they store great.

So, with potatoes, it seems as though a small potato does NOT have the genetic info to produce another small potato, so it doesn't matter much what size you plant? (as in, whether you cut up a big one or plant a small one whole)

Thanks, everyone, for all the info! Feeling more confident about my plan.

But with the common varieties you can always buy them from whole foods/organic section of the stores, much cheaper than mail order.
JMO

I don't think that sprouting is a result of light but rather time and temperatures.

We usually have good snow cover for most of the winter, and I have had potatoes that have stored outdoors in the soil (ones that I missed in harvesting) that sprouted in the spring and grew just fine. So in the fall you could try planting some of your crop of seed sized potatoes 6" deep or under a deep mulch for next year's crop, probably not the whole crop, but it might be worth an experiment, particularly for the potatoes that aren't good keepers.

I put a bag of potatoes in the refrigerator, and they sprouted much less than the ones kept in dark but not so cool conditions. They did still sprout, tho. Fingerlings more than others.

thanks

So, yes, you can dig a hole and store your tomatoes in the ground. But make sure that they will be kept dry and no rodent around to eat them.

Guess I'll go back to doing what I did in the early years before I did all this reading. :)

planatus, I love your storage solution!

Then there are years like this one.

Regarding light - light does not cause sprouting. If you've ever found forgotten potatoes in a cupboard with a nest of sprouts growing out of them, you'll know that. Light causes the sprouts to develop pigment, it doesn't cause the growth itself. After all, the plant is designed to grow from spuds that are underground from last year's plant.

I just dug up last year's potato patch, and found 5 tubers in the ground in perfect shape. One of them had already sprouted and sent out roots. They were about 6-8 inches deep, and survived a very cold New England winter in great condition.

I've never had an animal problem, so this year I might do an experiment and set a batch of tubers under the soil in the fall and then dig them up next year and see if they survive.