Has anyone ever tried growing potatoes in sacks? I have limited space and can vaguely remember seeing a trial on Gardeners world but can't remember the results. Any advice would be great :-\
Mine were a dissapointment....I dont think I watered them enough . They were meant to be ready for Christmas.... I,m still waiting ....I,m new to all this ... :-[ Rohaise
A few years ago i put mine in buckets and had about 2 meals from each bucket
i did have 2 sacks shoved behind the garage never looked at them never watered them and the poor things did really well considering the harsh treatment! we had a nice couple of meals out of them :D
I think the idea is Flowergirl that you roll the bag down, put a few inches of compost at the bottom then the seed potatoes then a bit more compost & wait till the leaves appear & add some more compost rolling the bag up a bit & keep doing this till the bag is full of compost & fully unrolled. Also make some drainage holes in the bottom & water regularly. Some people here have got it to work but personally I use big pots for extra earlies.
I put a potato in a sack last year as an experiment (the rest were in the ground) and was also disappointed. If you move the sack at all (it tilted over) you disturb the potatoes - you need to water it - you need to keep putting more earth into it - it got quite heavy and dfficult to tip the potatoes out - and there weren't many.
I'm sure it could be done better.
T&M have a potato tub which you treat just the same way as a sack, (holds about 42 litres of compost) and when you want to harvest, just unclip it and unroll from the soil/compost. It then either rolls up or opens flat for storage apparently. Only thing is the cost. They are £15.99 each I believe.
I wonder if builders merchants (Travis Perkins etc.) stock some kind of large diameter plastic pipe that could be just pulled up off the crop when ready?
you can use any old bags of previously used compost sifted out of hanging baskets etc that has worked for me too
;D Thanks for advice. I am going to plant some in regular pots and then others in sacks. Bit of an experiment if you like...I'll keep you posted. Cheers once again ;D
if using old compost etc remember they need feeding as well. Most gardeners lay muck in a trench put potatoes on top and cover and earth up as they grow.
What depth of soil do you need below the planted seed potato?
I grew mine last year in black potato bags that I bought from one of the suppliers- I found it fiddly, slugs and snails loved to hide there but crop was OK.
I do think that if you have lack of space, it is better to grow in the bag.
there are new bags that are advertised this year (with handles) but i think they are too expensive so i am going to improvise- you can buy more reasonably priced very similar plastic carrier (shopper), cut some holes at the bottom and try this. don't forget to top up the bags with compost!
Good luck!
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Quote from: GYO city gardener on March 03, 2007, 23:35:30
you can buy more reasonably priced very similar plastic carrier (shopper), cut some holes at the bottom and try this.
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Make sure they're completely opaque tho. :)
I started some off in an old compost bag with a mixture of garden/new compost a couple of weeks ago and noticed the first shoots appearing yesterday. What I'm not clear about is the topping up- does it mean cover the shoots, or wait until they've grown enough to be earthed up?
I suppose it saves time, just cut the green bit off the top and shake the mud out. ;D
I would use new compost as the nutrients would have been used by the previous plant, and may be harbouring a disease. :-\ better safe than sorry. :'( ;D ;D ;D