Potato growing and harvesting pictures

Potato growing and harvesting

Videos of planting in January 2026

Master Farms

The Le Maistre family

Creating furrows for planting

And cotils covered in plastic to provide an early crop

L'Etacq, 2026

Everyone joined in for the potato harvest

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French women who struggled to find work at home in Brittany and Normandy in the 19th and early 20th centuries, would travel to Jersey for the potato season with their husbands, other family members, or sometimes alone

A crucial stage between seasons. Potatoes being stacked in a farm loft to encourage them to develop sprouts before planting

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  Farm workers with a lorry load of seed potatoes
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  Seed potatoes
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  The hillside terraced at Bouley Bay for potato planting in 1919
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  Ploughing at L'Etacq
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  Planting behind a horse-drawn plough at the Le Brocq family farm in St Ouen in 1935
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  Breezing, or shallow ploughing near St Ouen's Mill
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  Planting at l'Etacq
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  Potato harvesting by hand in 1906
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  Cotils covered in polythene in 1992
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  Ploughing at Flicquet, St Martin
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  Planting potatoes photographed by Philip Morel-Laurens
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  Planting at St Ouen
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  Planting at St Saviour in the 1950s
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  Hand digging at the Ozouf family's Le Tapon Farm, St Saviour, in 1949
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Cotil planting

Jersey's earliest and best-tasting new potatoes are grown on south facing slopes in a number of locations. Planting usually starts in the first week of January - the week between Christmas and New Year if condition s are good, allowing harvesting to commence in March. Here cotils, as these sloping fields are known, are being planted for the Le Maistre family business at Gorey

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A potato harvesting team take a break at Clos Durell, Trinity, in the early 1950s. Third from left in the back row is George Augustus Messervy, with his son-in-law David John Henley, next to him in the taller hat

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  A good day's work over for the Le Conte family in St Lawrence in 1900
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  A 'complete fork' - a team of three lifting by hand
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  Lifting the old-fashioned way
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  Farm
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  Digging potatoes in 1936
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  A team relaxes after lifting potatoes
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  Planting at Grouville in 1938
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  1970s
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  1935
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  L'Etacq 1929
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  Planting
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  Digging potatoes
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  Planting in 1937
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  Potato digging

Planting at L'Etacq - picture Evening Post

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  A potato cart
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  A pause while picking potatoes for the Hills
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  Potato planting with a horse
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  Harvesting potatoes by hand
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  Banking potatoes in the 1920s
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  1932
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  1935
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  1935
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  Harvesting potatoes in Grouville in 1953
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  Potato planting in 1920
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  Potato lifting
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  Planting at L'Etacq in the 1950s
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  Potato harvest in July 1916 at A J Renouf's St Brelade farm.In the foreground are Mrs VIbert, Mrs Renouf's young daughter Lucille, Mrs Renouf and, on the far right, Mr Renouf and his young son Don. Behind them are three Breton workers.
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  Lifting potatoes in 1930
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  Peeling potatoes in 1920

Pldanting in St Ouen's Bay in 2023 - Picture Jersey Evening Post

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  Potato lifting team
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  Collecting potatoes for seed in 1948
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  Potato planting at Rozel
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  lifting potatoes in 1935
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  Harvesting potatoes at Greve de Lecq
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  Digging potatoes the traditional way
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  Potato diggers in 1905
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  The 1948 potato harvest
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  The 1914 potato harvest
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  A family lifting potatoes

Grouville fields covered in plastic in 2021 - photograph by Paul Lakeman

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  Le Villot Farm, 1914
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  Breton farmworkers in a potato field in 1928
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  Harvesting potatoes by hand
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  Planting a small field with the assistance of a horse

L'Etacq

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  Potato planting, 1905
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  Seed potatoes
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  Harvesting by hand in 1904
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  Planting a cotil
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  Planting a cotil in 1938
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  Planting potatoes by hand on a cotil
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  An early mechanical digger for lifting potatoes
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  Potato harvest at Springside, Trinity
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  Breton girls lifting potatoes in 1935
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  The cotils sloping down towards Mont Orgueil Castle are some of the best early land in the island
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  Planting at L'Etacq
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  Planting at St Catherine
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  Potato planting at L'Etacq in the early 20th century
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  Seed potatoes at Crabbe Farm
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  In 1918 growers were required to provide potatoes for the Army at a fixed price

These cotils at Gorey are among the earliest potato growing areas in the island