PARENTAGE
The parents of Valor are Cara and another unnamed variety.
APPEARANCE, TASTE AND CHARACTERISTICS OF VALOR
The Valor potato
This maincrop variety produces tall plants so may not be suitable for areas exposed to high winds. The purple flowers are freely produced. The potatoes have smooth, white skin with a light cream coloured flesh and only a few shallow eyes.
POSITIVE POINTS FOR VALOR
They have high resistance to splitting, remaining very solid potatoes. An excellent all rounder for cooking. Good resistance to blight especially of the tubers. Drought and heat resistant. Keeps well for a very long time.
NEGATIVE POINTS FOR VALOR
We can find no significant drawbacks to growing this variety of potato.
BUYING VALOR SEED POTATOES
Valor are not available in many garden centres or discount shops but they are available from several online suppliers.
We recommend buying your seed potatoes from certified suppliers because those sold in supermarkets for consumption can be a source of disease and pest. We would avoid buying them from online general retailers such as as Amazon or E-bay unless you know exactly who is supplying the seed potatoes.
Buying seed potatoes from the discount store can be a good deal but it can also result in a sub-standard crop. The discount stores take the second quality seed potatoes whereas the more specialist suppliers take the best quality. Unfortunately you will only find this out after you have carefully tended your crop for several months.
Suttons Seeds (a GardenFocused approved supplier) sell Valor seed potatoes (and many other varieties) which are not only correctly certified but they are graded by size to avoid unduly small seed potatoes being sold. Click here for more information and to buy Valor online. A 1kg bag will contain about 11 good sized seed potatoes.
ALTERNATIVES TO VALOR POTATOES
The key qualities of this variety are good resistance to blight of tubers, very versatile as far as cooking is concerned, tolerant of a wide variety of growing conditions including drought and heat. If those are your criteria for choosing this variety then there are no real alternatives. MaybeArran Victory comes closest, so is worth investigating.
For other potato varieties which we have fully reviewed, click the drop down box below, select a variety and then click the More Information Button.
The planting and harvest dates used below are correct for the UK average. If you want them to be even more accurate and adjusted for your area of the UK click here. It only takes a minute and the adjustment affects every date in this site and lasts for six months.
WHEN TO CHIT / SPROUT VALOR POTATOES
In all the tests we have conducted and those we have researched, there is no detectable difference between maincrop potatoes which are chitted and those which are planted directly in the ground. However if you want to stick with tradition and chit your Valor potatoes, we recommend that you start chitting / sprouting this variety in the third week of February.
This will give them four to five weeks to develop healthy sprouts just at the time when they are ready
to be planted out. Keep the potatoes in cool but light conditions to ensure they grow short, green sprouts. Click here for our page dedicated to chitting / sprouting potatoes in the UK and Ireland.
WHEN TO PLANT VALOR POTATOES
Valor potatoes are maincrop and they are ready for harvest, if conditions are correct, 18 to 20 weeks after the seed potatoes are planted. The key factor governing the time for planting all potatoes is the date of the last frost in your area. Even a touch of frost can damage potato plants if their foliage is above ground, an unexpected severe frost can kill them completely.
The date for planting Valor seed potatoes can be calculated on the basis that seed potatoes will take four weeks before they appear above ground. Given also that you want them to appear above ground only when the danger of frost has passed is (the last week of April is the UK average ) the last week of March about right time to plant them.
WHEN TO HARVEST VALOR POTATOES
The harvest date for all potatoes is not only dependent on when you plant your seed potatoes, it also depends on the weather conditions throughout the growing season. But on average you can expect your potatoes to be ready for harvest some time between the first and third weeks of August 2017 in your area of the UK.
PEST AND DISEASE RESISTANCE OF VALOR POTATO
The table below sets out how good or bad Valor potato plants are at resisting common pests and diseases in the UK. The 0 point is average with minus (red) values showing lower than average resistance and plus values (green) showing higher than average resistance.
| -5 | -4 | -3 | -2 | -1 | 0 | +1 | +2 | +3 | +4 | +5 | |
| Late blight – foliage |
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| Late blight – tubers |
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| Common scab |
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| Powdery scab |
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| Slugs |
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| Potato Cyst Nematode (pallida) |
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| Potato Cyst Nematode (rostochiensis) |
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| Blackleg |
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| Splitting |
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| -5 | -4 | -3 | -2 | -1 | 0 | +1 | +2 | +3 | +4 | +5 |
SUMMARY CHARACTERISTICS OF VALOR
TYPE: Maincrop
USE: A good all round variety except as salad potatoes
SKIN COLOUR / TEXTURE: White with smooth skin and few eyes
FLESH COLOUR: White
TASTE AND TEXTURE: Good flavour with a solid texture
STORAGE: Keeps very well, until April or May is a real possibility with this variety in the correct conditions.
POTATO SIZE: Average.
REGULARITY OF CROPPING: Regularly produces a good crop.
AWARDS: None
SPECIAL FEATURES: Tuber blight resistance and good in dry and warm conditions.
How to Grow Potatoes
Recommended Varieties
How to Chit / Sprout
Planting Seed Potatoes
Caring for Potatoes
Harvesting and Storing
Potatoes in Containers
Pest and Disease
VALOR POTATO
The Valor potato variety is, in our opinion, very underestimated. It's a tasty potato which produces a good yield and at the same time has good resistance to potato blight of the leaves and very good resistance to blight of the tubers.
Potatoes like lots of water to grow to full size but Valor can be left to its devices in most years because it grows well in warm dry conditions. This has been proven in the Middle East and North Africa.