Got the potatoes in this morning see here; http://tinyurl.com/32zlw8
n.b. I used the same preparation pictures as I used when planting my onions, see no point in taking more pictures of the same!!
By the way let me know if you spot the mistake I made!!
Wouldn't play for me today TeeGee.. not normally a problem
???
Nice piece of work. About 10 times as many as we plant.
Was the deliberate error that you forgot to mark the rows, or does that not matter?
i don't know what the mistake was, it looks good to me and you make it look so easy. i love the big bulb planter, i use one when i'm planting out leeks.
beautiful. my non-gardening pal is asking about planting spuds on the patio and I spied this thread.
I sat there transfixed for ages watching the slideshow. Very therapeutic.
;D
Not a slide show but...
(http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e190/Plot52/pots30407.jpg)
With onions in the background...
;D
Mesmerising - what is that digger/hoe/machine thingy at the beginning?
All this time when I dig a full trench to insert spuds I only need to extract soil the width of the spuds? Any problems doing it that way as I have 4 varieties left to sow (just asking before I start digging - anything to make kufe easier)
This year is the first time I've planted potatoes. Nowhere have I read that I should water them straight after planting? Is this correct, should I water or not? (The top half inch of soil is dry, but underneath that it is damp, not wet.)
I wouldn't bother watering them if the soil is damp underneath them, the roots will find their own way.
your trench maker looks a marvellous piece of kit where did you get it from?
good slide show!
It is not exactly a trench maker more of a tiller, although I do believe the 'tines' can be removed and substituted with a plough blade.
Where did I get it?
I inherited it with the plot when I took it over many years ago!
This is my first post. My friend Sarah (aka Supersprout and well-known here) left me with some seed potatoes and instructions to get them planted on Good Friday. I had a reflective hour or so doing just that ... but I'm not sure if I did the right thing by them.
In previous years I've dug a trench, put muck and my potatoes in, and taken it from there. This year I'm trying to replicate what Sarah did last year - she rejoiced in some very accessible potatoes that she easily lifted from the ubiquitous straw.
I'm planting into similarly mulched beds and I'm aiming at a minimum of digging. I made spaces in the straw and placed each seed potato in a shallow hole in the soft ground beneath. I then put a couple of handfuls of muck over each spud and re-covered with straw. I assume I'll need to add more straw as the plants grow.
Is this all? Was I right to plant my earlies (Swift and Rocket) and main crop (Amandines) at the same time?
Did my first & second earlies yesterday & will do the maincrops in a couple of weeks- more to spread out the digging than any other reason! Tried using a bulb planter but found the ground just fell back in before I could get the spuds in deep enough so dug a spadeful of soil out for each one instead.
When I was a small boy in the 1950's my Grandparents lived next door to an old-fashioned 40 acre farm with cows, pigs, chickens and ducks, and a carthorse called Dobbin, you can guess what the dog was called - Rover.
I remember that all the cows had the same Yorkshire name, "gert art yu boogger"
The purpose of this is to recall my planting potatoes and using a wheeled tiller of the same vintage as TeeGee's when weeding, I used to push it up and down the rows with two inward pointing blades, and when earthing up with sort of plough blades attached, as when digging the trench which was filled with incredible amounts of manure, cow, horse, pig and chicken.
I ended up with very strong muscles for a 12 year old, especially the lower arms from milking.
Halcyon days!
http://www.allaboutliverpool.com/allaboutallotments1_homepage.html
Well done Companion Plant - it sounds as if you have done things well. There really is no right or wrong way - I tend to leave a few weeks between first and main crops - I don't know why. I think you will need to add more mulch as the plants grow through - the big issue is to exclude the light so you don't get green spuds that you can't eat.
Quote from: companion_plant on April 10, 2007, 15:01:57
This is my first post. My friend Sarah (aka Supersprout and well-known here) left me with some seed potatoes and instructions to get them planted on Good Friday. I had a reflective hour or so doing just that ... but I'm not sure if I did the right thing by them.
In previous years I've dug a trench, put muck and my potatoes in, and taken it from there. This year I'm trying to replicate what Sarah did last year - she rejoiced in some very accessible potatoes that she easily lifted from the ubiquitous straw.
I'm planting into similarly mulched beds and I'm aiming at a minimum of digging. I made spaces in the straw and placed each seed potato in a shallow hole in the soft ground beneath. I then put a couple of handfuls of muck over each spud and re-covered with straw. I assume I'll need to add more straw as the plants grow.
Is this all? Was I right to plant my earlies (Swift and Rocket) and main crop (Amandines) at the same time?
well known indeed, much loved and missed too companion_plant !
welcome to the madhouse, glad you found your way here !
We do like a pic on here we do, so feel free to post some pics of piles of straw whenever you like !!! ;D
Thank you for the warm welcome and reassurance. I'll leave the spuds to do their thing ... and I've noted the encouragement to take and post pics. Will see what I can do. ;)
Hi TEEgee have looked at your great pics. I noticed you had spread something white on the ground.(for potatoes)?. Then I noticed that you had used the same intro as you did for the onions. I may be wrong.
QuoteI noticed you had spread something white on the ground.
Three things!!
Yes I used the same intro for the potatoes as I did for onions as I mentioned in my first post.
2nd; The white stuff is Fish Blood & Bone fertiliser.
3rd; No one has noticed my mistake; it was a case of; I have planted the pototatoes much closer than I would normally, I think I put my self off preparing for the 'photography'
Normally I would have had five tubers per row not six, and the rows were about 6" closer than I would normally.
I envisage a bit of a problem when I come to earth up I might not have enough soil to get a good height/width on the ridges.
I just left them as an experiment to see how they perform being so close together.
I think the fact that they are 1st earlies will help!!
Quote from: Tee Gee on April 11, 2007, 14:21:42
3rd; No one has noticed my mistake; it was a case of; I have planted the pototatoes much closer than I would normally, I think I put my self off preparing for the 'photography'
Normally I would have had five tubers per row not six, and the rows were about 6" closer than I would normally.
I envisage a bit of a problem when I come to earth up I might not have enough soil to get a good height/width on the ridges.
I just left them as an experiment to see how they perform being so close together.
I think the fact that they are 1st earlies will help!!
please keep us posted how yours do TG, I was told that my spuds are too close together too ::)
I put 1st earlies in 12" apart, rows about 15" apart
I put 2nd earlies in 12" apart, rows about 19" apart
earthed up as I planted, so all are under at least 10" soil, if not 12" :-\
as a complete novice to spuds I was really pleased when I saw your pics and saw that yours were planted quite close together!
A lot of hard work put in...looks really good.
Cant wait for things to grow now ;)
I plant earlies a foot apart in all directions, mulch thickly, and leave them flat. It works well.
This sounds quite like what I'm experimenting with this year. How deep do you plant? ... And how thick is 'thickly'??
I plant a trowel hole down, which is pretty variable. As long as the spud's covered, I don't worry. Six inches of fresh grass cuttings lasts the summer nicely, but don't use stodge as not everything manages to get through it.
Brilliant Slidhow Tee Gee.
I had intended to do step-by-step progress of setting up my raised beds so people could see how I did it, but in the end I thought I'd best just get on with it or they'll never be done. :D
Nice one.
Chappy.