Growing potatoes in straw or hay instead of planting

[chrissum]

Just read in Backwoods home magazine on the subject, just wondering if anybody here has done it, seems it would be easier, what is your opinion? thanks!

 

[vfem]

I layered straw into my potatoes as I hilled them last year. I didn't use just straw though. The layering and hilling worked great for me. I did my potatoes in a bucket!

 

[patandchickens]

I ahve not tried it (this will be my first year with potatoes) but have read numerous places that it works well if you do not have a mice/vole problem. But that if you do, it just turns into a buffet.

Good luck, have fun,

Pat, living in Mouse And Vole Central and thus not even gonna TRY it

 

[wifezilla]

Pat, living in Mouse And Vole Central and thus not even gonna TRY it

LOL

I'll trade you some slugs for a vole or two....just for the sake of dealing with something different for a change

(Only I could have slug problems in an arid region! Sure, the ducks eat them, but they think that after they eat the slugs for dinner, my plants are their dessert! )

 

[vfem]

Pat, living in Mouse And Vole Central and thus not even gonna TRY it

LOL

I'll trade you some slugs for a vole or two....just for the sake of dealing with something different for a change

(Only I could have slug problems in an arid region! Sure, the ducks eat them, but they think that after they eat the slugs for dinner, my plants are their dessert! )

Are you insane!!! I am so getting a flame thrower to deal with Vole's at this point... for real!

I would do anything to not have to deal with another one... EVER!

They have dug under my front walk with all the rain we've had and knocked my bricks out everywhere... my driveway... nightmare... my plant beds in the front yard... done for!!! They have killed anything that ever had a ROOT.

PLUS, the damaged my septic... these things are pure EVIL!!!!!!!

 

[jamespm_98]

I usually just lay my seed potatoes down on top of the broken ground and then cover with leaf mulch and straw. What I find is you don't seem to get quite as many potatoes, but they are easier to harvest. I then will just pull back the mulch and harvest a few each week as I need them. As the plant start to die back I will harvest the remainder. The other advantage is no weeding if you put on a thick enough layer of straw or other mulch like leaves. You will need to watch out for the occasional potato that does not get covered and will turn green.


In the picture below are my 2009 potatoes growing in the row just left of the center of the picture. Sorry it is not a better picture, but the only one I have from last year showing the potatoes. I have been growing them in this manner for about 2 years and really enjoy the ease of harvest.

 

[ducks4you]

Only I could have slug problems in an arid region! Sure, the ducks eat them, but they think that after they eat the slugs for dinner, my plants are their dessert! )

Have you tried burying beer in your garden (lawn)? I did that when I was living in town and growing tomatoes in the backyard with a slug problem. It was fun fishing those nasty slugs out of the flat beer!! (I always use the cheapest beer I can buy for this--NEVER MGD or TommieKnockers--yes we can get some of that here, but not Glacial, .)

 

[patandchickens]

Pat, living in Mouse And Vole Central and thus not even gonna TRY it

LOL

I'll trade you some slugs for a vole or two....just for the sake of dealing with something different for a change

How many thousand voles and mice (and star-nosed moles) would you like? Cover shipping and they are YOURS

I have slugs too. Not "Pacific Northwest" type having-of-slugs, but it gets plenty sluggy here by east coast standards and probably by Colorado standards too.

As vfem says, slugs just eat yer plants and squish under bare feet, they do not make a mess of your lawn or plug your drainage culvert up with their excavated soil or tunnel so that water runs right straight into your foundation drains or get into the house and cr*p all over your cupboards.

I am *hoping* that growing potatoes in the GROUND will be okay - since the moles found the veg garden last year, I am honestly not certain.

Pat

 

[lesa]

-I'll tell you my cats are hunters and not a mole, vole or mouse is safe!! Thank you kitties!

 

[wifezilla]

I could use them as chew toys for Zeus He is so wound up with the increase in daylight that cat is LITERALLY bouncing off the walls! GOod thing he is cute or I would have to kill him!

I tried the beer traps. I even tried poison (I know, I know, I got desperate!). It is UNREAL how many slugs I get. I also have earwigs and rolly pollys. The ducks really cut down on the number of critters, but they even ate my tomato plants! LOL

I am going to let the ducks forage before I plant. After that I will have to resort to hand picking.