Potato Surprise

Like so much this season in the garden, the potato harvest has been disappointing. I didn’t get many reds and even fewer Yukon Golds, so I put all my hope into the La Ratte fingerlings, which are the potatoes I really care about anyway. I’ve been patient. Very patient. Finally the plants are starting to die back, so I thought I’d take a peek tonight.

I dug up one of the reds I’d left in, thinking maybe there would be more potatoes, but alas, there were only four potatoes on that plant. But as soon as I dug my fingers into the fingerling plant, I knew there was cause for celebration. A large, mangled tuber was near the top. I dug down, but the next thing I saw was not a potato– it was definitely an egg.

There was a whole cache of turtle eggs down there, five perfectly white, smooth eggs.

We have a lot of turtles, and we saw them laying eggs in the lawn earlier this summer.

I disrupted these eggs pretty thoroughly. I couldn’t help but pick them up and hold them in my hand. I had to move them away from the potato plant. All I can say for myself is I did not shake them. Finally, I covered them back up with the loosened dirt.

According to a generic web search, turtle eggs hatch after 45 days, which would be well overdue if they were laid back in May. It’s likely they are/were not going to hatch. Maybe they were waiting for those other pale orbs to make a move.

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