starting to get potatoes

Wow, Josh, your haul is amazing. A real poster child for SFG! Thanks for the pics. Nonna

Josh, you are such an inspiration to us "older" folks. I haven't had the courage to dig into my potatoes. I want to be surprised or disappointed all at once and get it over with.

The vines on my potatoes are still blooming and are drooping over the highrises so much that I had to move them over to give the carrots some sunshine. I have never had potatoes get that high.

southern gardener wrote:wow! that's impressive Josh! wtg!! what do you have in your compost mix that you think is working so well? We are trying to get a "really good" compost pile going for filling up squares as we plant. Thanks!!

I plant the potatoes in the same SFG every year, that may not be the thing to do, but that's what I do. In the spring I "fluff" up the Mel's mix, and add one thing to it, rabbit poop. The potatoes don't get any special caring for, I don't give them worm compost or tea, I don't always water them as much as I do the other SFGs, the potatoes are pretty much on their own, they grow or they don't. I add some rabbit poop to them maybe 2 - 3 times more until they bloom, sometimes they don't always bloom, but they always have potatoes. Since we had such a dry garden year, and I didn't always water them, they might have gotten bigger if I had watered them, but even small they are still good to eat! There was no bad ones in the bunch, bug and disease free. The white ones are a smaller round white potato and the red ones were from store bought red potatoes.

I use a lot of rabbit poop in the SFGs. I use worm compost and tea on special things to me that I want to do extra well, like tomatoes, big pumpkins, carrots, things like that. I have one 4 x 4 SFG that has a worm tube, and I must say it puts out pretty nice stuff.

Southern gardener, if you don't have rabbits and you don't want to raise rabbits, look for someone in your area that sells rabbits, I bet if you find someone they will give you some rabbit poop. It can go right on the garden, you don't have to compost it first.

Be sure to keep me posted greatgranny on your results, maybe you will be the one with the biggest potato for the BIG STUFF

click here to see my fertilizer maker:

thanks Josh for the info. I have access to about all the alpaca manure I want, is it close to rabbit manure? Not too many rabbit people around here

Josh wrote:

southern gardener wrote:wow! that's impressive Josh! wtg!! what do you have in your compost mix that you think is working so well? We are trying to get a "really good" compost pile going for filling up squares as we plant. Thanks!!

I plant the potatoes in the same SFG every year, that may not be the thing to do, but that's what I do. In the spring I "fluff" up the Mel's mix, and add one thing to it, rabbit poop. The potatoes don't get any special caring for, I don't give them worm compost or tea, I don't always water them as much as I do the other SFGs, the potatoes are pretty much on their own, they grow or they don't. I add some rabbit poop to them maybe 2 - 3 times more until they bloom, sometimes they don't always bloom, but they always have potatoes. Since we had such a dry garden year, and I didn't always water them, they might have gotten bigger if I had watered them, but even small they are still good to eat! There was no bad ones in the bunch, bug and disease free. The white ones are a smaller round white potato and the red ones were from store bought red potatoes.

I use a lot of rabbit poop in the SFGs. I use worm compost and tea on special things to me that I want to do extra well, like tomatoes, big pumpkins, carrots, things like that. I have one 4 x 4 SFG that has a worm tube, and I must say it puts out pretty nice stuff.

Southern gardener, if you don't have rabbits and you don't want to raise rabbits, look for someone in your area that sells rabbits, I bet if you find someone they will give you some rabbit poop. It can go right on the garden, you don't have to compost it first.

Be sure to keep me posted greatgranny on your results, maybe you will be the one with the biggest potato for the BIG STUFF

click here to see my fertilizer maker:

Cute pic of bunny. I love rabbits as long as they stay out of my garden. My cats keep them away.

Don't have to compost it? That is good to know. Now I just have to find a rabbit farmer. Think I'll check out the area for free rabbit "turds" - as my kids would say. Do you just drop them in the MM without breaking them up? Hope so.

I too have not been watering my potatoes as much as the rest of the garden. I recall wet years when gardening the "other" way. The potatoes were not good. Some even seemed to be rotting right in the ground.

yolos wrote:My potatoes never flowered. The tops eventually died and I dug them up. One variety was red pontiac and they were a good size for that variety. The other were white baking type (can't remember the name) and on the small size but still big enough for me.

My potatoes were the same as yours! I didn't get flowers either but I am getting potatoes like you, mostly smaller but a few were bigger. I planted a 4' x 6' and I should have planted closer.

walshevak wrote:Here's this years harvest of potatos from my house.
from the orange potato sack


and the blue bin along with todays harvest. tomato, lettuce, green beans, eggplant, thai basil, potatos, carrots and broccoli greens.



Kay

Very nice harvest Kay! Beautiful!