Small potatoes yield Videos

Give them as much sun as you can feed regularly with comfrey tea or tomato feed when producing tubers. Good luck.

+Lois McQuinn Firstly welcome to the channel :o) I'd put the potatoes in the sunniest position you have BUT you will have to keep a eye on them and make sured they do not dry out! As for what I add to my compost- well apart from my home made compost I add Blood, fish and bone / Growmore fertliser and a hand full of chicken manure. All the best Chris.

+Kian! At The Disco For best results your compost pile requires a balance of carbon and nitrogen,.Carbon is generally know as browns and covers things such as autumn leaves news paper cardboard and straw. Items containing nitrogen are generally known as greens such as kitchen scraps, grass clippings and green waste from the allotment or garden. I try to do a 40/60, 35/65 in favour of the greens but most gardeners have there own opinion to the ratio they like. Hope this helps a little. Chris

Thanks Phil. It's good to know my videos have given you food to thought. Good luck in the season ahead. Chris

+Chris's Allotment Journal Bloody brilliant Chris. perfect i was chuffed with 15lb but 24 is unbelievable

Not bad for just 2 seed potatoes Tony was it.

+Chris's Allotment Journal You are very welcome my friend,Ally

Thanks Ally

Thank you.

+Mary Bruce I'm not sure if sarpos a available in Canada. I know people have a trouble getting them in the USA so could b tricky.All the best. Chris

Hmm...I guess I failed to mention that they're in a container. Not much room for trenches. No biggie. I covered the smaller ones and I'll just let the tall ones be. They should still produce *some* pots, right?

Hey Mike, great video by high yields you mean in number ? or bigger size potatoes ?! I don't mind getting small number but bigger potatoes, do you have an idea how ?! Thanks

Great looking garden. I've been growing mine in 5 gallon buckets. I don't think I'm getting any higher yield but it sure is easy to harvest.

hi Mike how long is your beds? can this be done on larger scale? confirm its 90lbs you got?

I would dig a trench and lay it sideways and bend the top so it sticks out of the ground.

+JOE KOSLOWSKI I didn't follow the method like I did the year before, so the results was a fail... So lesson learned on following the system. Next year will be better =) But I did publish a video of our failed potatoes this year

+lmannyr1 I bought it from Pacific top soil. I went to my local lumber yard and asked them who supplies there lumber then I worked backwards, went to the lumber mill, then to pacific topsoil who receives the sawdust from the lumber mill. I hope this helps, thank you for watching!!

+Moms Simple Life My husband bought some food grade buckets from the dough nuts shop and he paid $3 per bucket.  I guess I'll try it and see what happens.

https://youtu.be/PHhh__9zdbc?list=PLcVdSRksaMzHxekOUya54CSHBSAEyNeRe Here is a great bucket harvest, but these potatoes he grew are not in the USA =( But if you can find containers like this I'm sure you'll do great. Have you checked out my "how to have a successful potato tower" video yet? I did a lot of research on what potatoes should grow well in towers. but if your doing smaller buckets you should be fine with more potatoes. Make sure to follow the 6 laws of plant growth.

Thank you for your reply.  My husband and I went to Panera Bread, McDonalds, and dough nut shops in the area but they didn't have free buckets.  I am thinking of buying the buckets at Lowes for $2.97, but not sure if they're food grade either.

You can try Craigslist, that is the best place I know. Also you can usually get free barrels at car wash places, but they are not food grade barrels. If you can sew some bags up, they should do the job. I used weed block fabric to make these bags, I hope to get the same amount as last year. I hope this helps!

That sounds delicious, I'll try to find that style of carrot online. I haven't seen that type in the stores around, but heard you can buy any seed you ever want on Ebay =) I'm worried that the carrots will look funny, I saw LDS preppers video of his harvest, and his carrots looked weird, maybe it was the brand... I'm hoping to get the sweet potato slips planted this week, but the weather has turned to rain... I have a large 12' X4' bed for sweet potatoes, but hope to get even more sweet potatoes from it this year, or at least have a successful sweet potato barrel. Supposedly you can't grow sweet potatoes up here, but I figured after LDS prepper said all you need to do is to follow the 6 laws of plant growth, I was determined to succeed. lolI am trying to eat healthy lately for my kids, my self and my health. I've been hoping the more I plant, the more healthy I'll eat. But we all know that's not always true =(

+Moms Simple Life Newspaper is surprisingly good insulation especially if you wrinkle several layers since it creates air spaces.The trick with getting vines to set roots is to keep contact with the soil so anything that will help keep contact will help them take root. It's why making some form of clips will help. The other option is my personal favorite plant ties, old stockings. I buy them at the dollar store and cut them cross wise to make rings then cut the rings so you get stretchy ties. If you drill a small hole on either side of your main hole then use the stocking ties you can wrap them around the vine to hold them in place. They work extremely well for tomato plants and bean plants. Willow tea should help root crops. I know the hormone they contain stimulates root growth. My favorite carrots to grow are Danvers Half Longs. They are a lot hardier than Scarlet Nates and make nice plump carrots. They aren't your classic carrot shape but they a great reliable heirloom. Scarlet Nates are more of a classic carrot shape but require more care and better soil. I've gotten good crops of Danvers Half Longs out of plain ole sand and clay soil. Pretty bullet proof. I even had a seed wash out of the raised beds and managed to grow an impressive carrot in hard clay below the raised beds. One of my favorite side dishes is sauté carrots in butter then glaze them with a little maple syrup. Extremely tasty and healthy, I learned that one out of the Fit For Life diet book.

That's an awesome idea!!! I will definitely have to try the insulation idea. I love the V wire to hold the vines in the hole, I cant wait to try it out and see how it works! I'll try to find some willow branches, I think I've seen them somewhere around my block. I hope this works, because I want my front yard bed to be used for carrots next year. We love carrots lol

+Moms Simple Life Try wrinkling up newspaper on top of the sweet potatoes to protect them from frost. You can use the plastic to hold it down so they don't blow off. Newspaper is a better insulator and will still allow the plants to breath. Old sheets work too. I'm curious if the vines will root and set potatoes through the holes in the barrel? It should work. Here's an idea, get some wire that's maybe slightly springy. Old coat hangers would work. Bend them into a "V" shape then compress them enough to force them through the hole so they spring out a bit once inside. Hook those over the vines as clips. I think if you can force the vines into the holes then clip them in some way so they stay in contact with the soil they should take root. I've seen sweet potatoes take root in weird places. You could even use a piece of straight wire. Just force it the hole parallel with the surface of the barrel on the inside then feed it over the vine and under the barrel surface on the opposite side of the hole. You just want to keep the vine pressed up against the soil. If you can track down some willow branches I know spraying willow tea over the vine will help it produce roots. Really curious how you do with the sweet potatoes? I'm in Arizona until next year and it's hard to grow much here.

+Cary Howe I haven't planted the sweet potato slips in the tower, yet. I'm trying to come up with a way to cover them on cold nights. But I'm still going to try it fail or not its worth a shot. I have a sweet potato bed in our front yard that has plastic covering it most of the season, due to the cold nights. We are hoping to come up with away to grow them in a smaller space with the same yield. Do you think I should plant the slips on the top of the barrel and when the vines grow down, have 2 holes with a slit connecting the two holes, in which I can push the vines into? Just an idea... The way I'm originally thinking of planting them is drill holes for good air circulation like I normally do then have my slips planted in some of those holes, and on top of the barrel. What do you think?

+Stacy Edwards I did a lot of research online, there isn't a definite list out there. From my research they say that mid to late season potatoes produce spuds up the stem, also all red potatoes. We will see if at the end of the season if all of my research holds any truth. We had a very successful red potato barrel last year, I made sure to follow the 6 laws of plant growth. I also watched every failed potato barrel and towel video on YouTube, to see what they might have done wrong. I hope this helps!

Don't worry, I just finished building my new computer. New videos to come in the future!

Thank you very much

Glass, signs, or any transparent block.

+johnyboytown It's all about planting the right variety. Late season potatoes will make tubers to the top of a tower. Early season ptoatoes will only make tubers at one level just above where the seed potato was planted. Most red potatoes do well growing in towers. Newer varieties of potatoes are developed for mechanical harvest so they only make tubers ar one level. The old late season potatoes are good for growing in towers. As long as the stem is covered with soil they will continue making spuds.

+Joe Schmoe And be sure to use heavy crap clay soil. His harvest would have been 10x that amount had he a brain.

That's right Justin. We will try to harvest them together, but if one set is obviously ready before the other, we will harvest that group first (vines die back). We try to segregate the types, but if we run short of onevariety, we will finish the row with another variety. I guess the measure of success is mostly the Oliver Twist method (Food - glorious food! ) :) Whichever produces the best quality and largest yield overall. But it isn't going to be a think of weighing the whole harvest  - vs weighing the other harvest. There will have to be a clear difference or I will judge it to be equal :)

It will be interesting! Thanks!

Keep us posted on how it works for you if you give it a try! I'm interested in hearing from all areas on this experiment. Looking forward to seeing if it makes a difference here :)

Same here. We will definitely be doing updates on this whole experiment! Thanks!

Yes - let the cut surfaces dry for a couple of days. This creates a surface that doesn't rot easily when you plant the potatoes. Glad you're enjoying the channel! Please feel free to ask about planting the potatoes when you are ready. Plant the potatoes the same way we show in the Winter Potatoes video. Keep us updated on how it goes!

+jerry prewettThe farmers coop is a good place to get seed potato! :)

I USEALLY GET MINE AT THE FARMERS CO-OP

Our local ACE hardware has seed potatoes in for $1 / pound. There are a lot of good suppliers out there :)

So true Teresa. Sounds like you are ready for planting too :) Thanks!

Our two oldest are finished with school. The three others of course have a ways to go. We set our curriculum - we don't buy a homeschooling course or anything like that. We don't go for a public school "homeschool" program. Some people would say that we "unschool". Not sure if that is accurate because we have the schoolbooks for the kids and we require them to learn the basics of reading, math etc. They often get to learn these in a practical application way. but they must have the basics down to be able to do that. We don't subscribe to the idea that "they will learn when they are ready". That rarely works unless they are encouraged to learn.While my wife works out of the house, I also do some remote web development work which brings in a small bit of income. The budget is always tight, but we get by :)