Growing Potatoes in a Bag

Some years ago I tried growing potatoes, but the clay/soil was too
hard and they didn't do well. I found this neat and novel way of growing them and thought it would be fun.
Gary/Louisville

a pretty neat 'tater planting idea...it's also really EZ sounding!

materials:
*bag of compost or potting soil
*black plastic garbage bag
*seed potatoes ( 3-4 )
To prepare:
Set the potatoes on a window sill with their shoots pointing up for a
couple
weeks until they start to show green leaf sprouts. Fill the bag (
poke small
holes for drainage into the bottom ) with soil until its 1/3rd full.
Put the
potatoes on top of the soil, spacing them apart. Cover the potatoes
completely
with more soil ( until bag is about 1/2 full ) and water well. Be
certain there
are holes poked in the bag bottom so excess water can leak out. Place
bag
outside in a sunny area. Check moisture levels often and water as
needed. Once
the plants have grown tall ( about 8" ) fill the bag with more soil
until the
bag is full. This encourages the plants to produce more potatoes and
keeps the
potatoes covered so they won't turn green. After about 3 months, your
potato
plants should flower and the new potatoes will be ready to harvest ( i
personally waited until the growth yellowed to start digging ). Tear
or cut
open the bag, collect potatoes, and wash and dry.

Hmmm...I may try this with sweet potatoes. My soil and conditions never seem to give me much of a harvest. This looks like a great alternative, and I was wanting something to grow at the greenhouse door in some kind of container. Better get moving....it's about 'tater time here!

Good idea. I think a garbage can works to.

I have ordered some seed potatoes and have NO idea what to do with them. So the potatoes-in-a-bag idea sounds great. But, being totally ignorant about growing potatoes, I would like to ask a question or two.

VGMKY, you said that when the plants are about 8 inches high, to fill the bag with soil. Do you mean that the plants and its leaves should be totally covered with soil?

If so, then I would assume that the plants will find their way to the light again. And potatoes must form along the plant's roots as it grows upward?

Thanks for any information anyone has.

Jean

We also use this method for growing some of our potatoes. the crop is never as large as it could be in a ground situation but it's helpful where space is a problem but watering isn't.

VGMKY here, Tatties are used as a crop where farmers want to turn clay pasture into arable, they break up the soil much better for the following cereals.

I'm going to give it a go. I live in the New Orleans area and the soil here is rather clay-ey. The water table is also tends to be very high (dig down a couple of feet and you hit water -- that's why we don't have cellars and we bury our dead above-ground).

To complicate matters, whoever lived here before me had a load of oyster shells dumped in the yard and then covered with mud. So everytime we dig, we run into oyster shells and big tree roots. Aggggghhhhhh!!!

I have been trying to till, but it has been rough going. So it appears that raised-beds and containers will be a short-term solution until we can get the soil conditioned.

I have also been reading about growing potatoes in straw. Has anyone any experience with that?

I use leaves.....like this.

I move my compost pile around so each spring I have
a new spot to work on. take a layer of compost and
manure - lay potatoes on top - cover with leaves.
monitor throughout the season to make sure the leaves
are on thick enough - after foliage dies - brush leaves away and go go.

Louisiana Sweet Pea, you can cover the potato plant up until about 2 to 3" are all that is above ground/straw.
My concern with the black garbage bag is, doesn't it get too hot in there? I wanted to stack tires to make a potato tower, but my DH said it would get too hot and cook the plants. Has anyone had experience with this?

It won't get to hot in Washington state to grow potatoes in a tire or stack of tires

That's true, in Washington you can do it without cooking them.
But how about SW Missouri? Has anyone in these type parts been able to grow potatoes in a tire tower or black bag?

Could be the heat build up could be reduced by painting the tires with cheap latex white paint after the temps get high. Just a thought. Or shade it a bit with something on the sunny side.

Yea, it seems like the white paint idea would work. Thanks.