How to Use Sulfur on Fresh-Cut Potato Tubers

Potatoes are rarely planted from a true seed. Instead, small potato tubers, called seed potatoes, produce new roots and stems to grow into a fully producing plant. Cutting large tubers into two or more pieces allows you to grow more potato plants from a single seed piece, but the cut sides of the pieces are more prone to disease and rot problems after planting. Coating the pieces with an elemental sulfur dust minimizes the chance for problems after planting, allowing your potato tubers to grow into productive plants.

Elemental sulfur powder
Paper bag
Knife

Instructions

- 1
  Place a 1-inch layer of elemental sulfur power in the bottom of a lunch-sized paper bag.
- 2
  Cut your potato tuber into smaller pieces using a clean, sharp knife. Make each piece at least 1 inch in size. Each cut piece must contain at least one healthy bud or eye, which resembles a small knob or the beginning of a sprout on the surface of a tuber. Dispose of tubers that have soft spots that indicate rot.
- 3
  Place two to three cut pieces in the bag with the sulfur. Fold the top over and shake it so the pieces become completely coated in the sulfur.
- 4
  Coat the remaining pieces in the sulfur, shaking only two to three potato pieces at a time. Add more sulfur powder to the bag as necessary.
- 5
  Plant the sulfur-treated pieces in the garden immediately after coating.

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