Origins and the calendar
The US potato calendar: who ships when
Most US potatoes come from fall-harvested storage regions, Idaho, the Columbia Basin, Wisconsin and Colorado's San Luis Valley, that ship from their cellars through winter and spring, while the Red River Valley anchors reds and yellows and Florida and California run the fresh winter and spring crops. Potato price action is largely this origin rotation, one region handing the market off to the next.
Updated Aug 20, 2026
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Most US potatoes come from a handful of storage regions that harvest in the fall and ship from their cellars all year, so the potato calendar is really a relay of origins handing off one to the next. The big northern and mountain districts carry the country through winter and spring. The southern and coastal crops fill the fresh window. Almost every seasonal price move traces to which origin is winding down and which is starting up.
The fall storage crop
- Upper Valley / Twin Falls-Burley (ID) (norkotah)
- Upper Valley / Twin Falls-Burley (ID) (burbank)
- USDA mostly / low-high range
The heart of the market is the fall-harvested storage crop. Idaho, the Columbia Basin across Washington and Oregon, Wisconsin and Colorado's high-elevation San Luis Valley all dig their crop from late summer into October, cure it and store it, then ship steadily for months. Idaho alone runs new potatoes from around August and draws its cellars down into the following summer. The Idaho chart above carries that story between quotes: a price line through the storage season and the shipment volumes behind it. These are russet-heavy regions, and they set the tone for the national russet market.
Reds, yellows and the Red River Valley
- Red River Valley (MN-ND)
- USDA mostly / low-high range
The round-potato side runs on its own clock. The Red River Valley along the Minnesota and North Dakota line is the anchor for reds and yellows, harvesting in the fall and shipping its crop east over a long season that stretches into spring. Wisconsin and Michigan add round-potato storage supply through the same window. The chart above tracks the valley's FOB. Read reds and yellows as a separate market from russets, on a separate handoff, even when both are moving at once.
The fresh winter and spring crops
The South and West cover the fresh end. Florida's Hastings district grows a winter-into-spring crop of reds and whites dug fresh, not stored. California's Kern County is the big spring-market origin, planted in late winter and harvested around June. These fresh crops arrive as the stored northern supply ages, so they matter most in the back half of the storage year when they start to relieve the old crop. New crop versus storage crop is the handoff that ends one origin's season and opens another's.
Reading the rotation
Because the windows shift year to year with the weather, this site does not pin a fixed calendar to each origin. It derives each region's typical shipping months from USDA movement volumes and marks a district quiet when its fresh quotes thin out, which is normal rotation and not a data gap. To see who is shipping right now, read the origins currently quoting on the live pages rather than a month printed from memory.
The Russet Report reports each origin's prices and volumes as USDA publishes them. Exact start and end dates move with the crop, so we read them off the live quotes rather than forecasting a transition before it shows up.
Now look at the live data
Common questions
When is potato season in the US?
Year round, because most of the crop is stored rather than shipped fresh. The big fall-harvested regions dig from late summer into October, cure the crop and then ship from their cellars through winter and spring. The fresh southern and coastal crops fill the window as the stored supply ages.
Which states ship the most potatoes?
The fall storage regions carry the market: Idaho, the Columbia Basin across Washington and Oregon, Wisconsin and Colorado's San Luis Valley, all russet-heavy. The Red River Valley along the Minnesota and North Dakota line anchors reds and yellows on its own clock. Florida's Hastings district and California's Kern County run the fresh winter and spring crops.
When does the new potato crop start?
It varies with the weather, which is why this site does not print a fixed calendar. Idaho runs new potatoes from around August. California's Kern County is harvested around June and Florida digs through winter into spring. To see who is shipping right now, read the origin pages for the districts currently quoting rather than a month from memory.