Growing potatotes in garbage cans

[WolverineDG]

I stumbled upon this at frugalvillage.com . They can also be grown in tires! Sounds easy enough & I can't wait to try it!

http://www.ciscoe.com/archive/spuds.html

http://the-goodlife.blogspot.com/search/label/potatoes

http://ww.uniontrib.com/uniontrib/20060122/news_1hs22sage.html

dg

[Richard Steele]

1. That's good info! I grew potatos in 5-gallon plastic containers last year, for the first time.

Or, I should say I grew potato PLANTS.

I didn't get around to starting the potato experiment
until late in the summer, and the cool weather started
killing the plants just as they were beginning to produce
the potatos. But each container had over a dozen tiny
potatos in it- if I had just gotten them in a few weeks earlier,
I would have had a nice harvest.

This year I'm going to start them inside and set them out
in early spring. The containers are small enough to carry
back in the house if we get a late cold spell, and if they
grow well I should be able to get 2 full harvests before the fall.

The plants did AMAZINGLY well in those small containers.
By the time they flowered, they were 3-4 feet above the
original seed-potato level. I had to make my containers
taller by cutting the bottoms off of other containers, and
sliding the remaining top over the plants to "stack" into
the original buckets.

One area of the experiment was a failure that you all
might want to know about.

That person who wrote that link used compost to cover his plants,
and back when I was a kid I saw folks use straw.... So, in one container,
I used cedar shavings. I figured they had similar covering properties
to straw, but might also have the extra benefit of repelling insects.

It didn't work. For whatever reason, the plants in that container
grew just as large but didn't produce a single potato.

[WolverineDG]

2. Good luck!

I'm pretty good at growing tomato plants & no tomatoes. :( Got any ideas on good seedling potatoes for South Texas? :) (Or where I can get any?)

dg

[Richard Steele]

3. The best way to get good seed potatos-

Go to your local "farmers market", buy good locally-grown potatos,
then leave them in a paper bag until they sprout eyes.

That's what I did- I'd been buying those potatos for months from a local grower,
so I knew they were tasty and I knew they would grow OK here in NC.

Actually, that's what I'm doing right now- I got some more back in November
from the same guy (my second favorite variety- he ran out of my faves in August)
and they're in a bag on the back porch. Some of the "eyes" are over an inch long,
so I figure I'll be cutting them up and getting them started in their buckets
in another 2 weeks or so.

[WolverineDG]

4. There's no local farmers market here

:(

But I did do a google search & found some places in Austin to check out when I get up in that direction. :)

dg

[Richard Steele]

5. What a bummer- I'm sorry to hear that.

Our local farmer's market is just the best place-
makes me remember what real food tasted like when
I was a kid.

Good luck on your seed-potato quest! :thumbsup:

[xmas74]

6. My parents did

metal trash cans when I was young. They read about it in Mother Earth and it worked quite well.

[sazemisery]

7. You've inspired me, Wolfie

I ordered Yukon Gold, All Blue and Cranberry Red potatoes. I have 4 55 gallon white plastic drums that had carrot juice in them. So I will be ready to go when planting time arrives.