Potatoes in a bin

I have two dustbins in the greenhouse, one planted with Sharpe's Express and the other with Pentland Javelin, both first early. Everything's identical, seed is the same make, bought from the same garden centre, chitted,set in the same compost on the same day.
No sign of the Javelin.

Paul G

 

Awesome idea, but is there a reason you planted them so deeply in the shade? Wouldn't it be more logical to put more soil or some stones into them to get them closer to the sun?

My father first the same thing by the way. He always plants sweet potatoes in some raised plastic beds. During harvest season he can just topple them for easier access.

 

I'm under the impression that as the stem grows you add more compost,
same as moulding them up when planted in the garden, but more so.

I believe that the potatoe is part of the stem of the plant as it goes green if left in the sun.

Paul G

 

In the past I have used potato bags to grow in and have earthed up as the leaves appear and had decent yields. The bags fell apart, so I am using 30l buckets this year. I have filled these to the top after watching several channels I follow on YouTube and they do this every year. Seems like less work for me and a bit of extra protection from the cold for spuds. They are in GH at the minute ( Arran Pilot and Pentalan Javlin).

Rusty

 

Everyone has their own way of growing potatoes.

I prefer the all-in-one-go approach so no adding compost layer by layer.

Here are tidbits that you might find useful for growing main crop potatoes:

- Each eye on a chitted potato is cable of forming one plant;
- Each plant produces on average about 5-6 spuds;
- The leaves are a food factory for the plant so a canopy covering a large area will produce a bigger crop.


If you're interested in growing potatoes in containers, specifically a 14L bucket, why not join in on our community garden's annual The Spud in A Bucket growing competition set to commence at the beginning of April.

The current garden record is 3.9kg of potatoes!