Potato planting

[valley ranch]

Sounds like a lot more work them what we have been doing FOREVER in husbands family. Just hoe a trench about 6 inches deep. Cut seed potatoes into pieces with 2 eyes in each piece and place eyes up in trench. Set your heel on the one you just put in and drop the next one in front of your foot. Continue to end of row. Go back and pile soil into (and slightly hill up) over the potatoes. We have never added fertilizer and they grow just fine!
Here is the harvest from a few years ago. Planted a few pounds of REd and a few pounds of white! View attachment 26271

Your soil must be nice and rich ```

 

[Carol Dee]

Your soil must be nice and rich ```

Slowly getting better. It was an old LAND FILL! But we hauled in lots of rich Iowa topsoil, compost, sand, etc.... add more mulch, grass clippings etc... each season. Move them around so they are not in same spot every year. Alternate with the beans and peas.

 

[digitS']

It's my understanding that the gardeners of the "lazy beds" of Ireland often used kelp to cover the potatoes. These were on ground close to the ocean where seaweed could be gathered after storms and at low tide. Probably, the soil in these locations wasn't very fertile.

The term "lazy bed" didn't just apply to those using seaweed and had to be a misnomer, where it was the case. Imagine carting wet seaweed up from the shore in sufficient amounts to cover large plantings of potatoes!

Steve

 

[digitS']

Here's something that I posted a few years ago, archeological evidence of lazy beds in Ireland. Click that photo link . Beautiful place:

Does this look like what a lazy gardener would do?

View attachment 9640
© Copyright Pamela Norrington and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

"Lazy beds at the Deserted Village, Slievemore
The Deserted Village is located on the southern slopes of Slievemore,straddling the 200 foot contour and stretching from west to east for about 1.5km. The village comprises 3 settlements, linked by an ancient pathway.

The village dates from c1750 and was deserted in 1850s." (LINK)

Steve