I’ve been using a regular garden fork to dig my potatoes, and no matter how far out I go, no matter what method that I try, I always end up chopping my biggest and best potatoes in half. I probably lost 15 to 20% of my yield this year because of this. No matter what I did, every other hill or so, I pull out my fork and have three big potatos stuck in the tines.
I think pitchforks work the best. That is what we use.
You could also put gloves on and harvest the potatoes by hand. A lot of people do that.
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I may try that next time, but I’ll at least need to crack the surface with a fork a couple times.
I think that it depends on the soil and the climate how the surface of the soil is. I think that a pitch fork works best because there is nothing sharp curving downwards and they are good for breaking up soil, technically you can do this without digging up the plants just dig to the sides of the plants, either way you need to use your hands anyway
I prefer to pull them when the state of the soil allows. Then I go back and dig for what remains.
Your yield must be really high to have such a concentration of big tubers
“and no matter how far out I go”. Did you reach a practical limit (obstruction or other plantings), or was there room to start digging even farther out?
best to dig in from the side. less change of damage.