Potatoes in containers?

Posted this in Container Gardening but have not had any response. Someone suggested that I try posting ithere, too.

I've been reading up on ways to grow potatoes in a container. I'd like to give it a try just for the fun of it. My kids will get a kick out of fishing around for their own taters. I'm thinking of growing the fingerling/small kind and was wondering if anyone here has done this before. I think I'm leaning towards the mulching method and would like to get some feedback and/or advice. Thanks, everyone.

i did it in a big half-barrel... just used a few store potatoes and let them sprout and then popped it in there. three months and i had a bunch of baby potatoes that we roasted and ate! hope this helps -

I planted one of your winged beauty seeds in a rapid rooter... do you know if they need stratification/scarification at all? there's like 0 info about in online.

You used store bought ones, huh? All the info I've read says to buy seed potatoes. I suppose I can just get some organically grown potatoes and start with those. Did you throw mulch on top from time to time?

A little nick and some soaking will help the winged beauty germinate faster. What's a rapid rooter?

Also, on a different thread you talked about your blackberries. What kind do you grow? There are so many different varieties out there, it's hard for me to figure out which ones are best for this area.

I have black satin blackberries. they're a monrovia nursery cultivar. i haven't got any fruit yet but we'll see next season. rapid rooters are little plugs with active bacteria that help rooting/germination. i didn't mulch it at all.

I used seed potatoes (Carola) from Wood Prairie Farm in Maine. Got about 2 tiny potatoes from a very large bin and three seed taters. The same seed potatoes in the garden yielded more like 25 good sized potatoes each. I did the container for the same reason you want to -- the kids -- but I'll skip it next year. Anyway, actually digging in the dirt for the golden treasures is magical for the little squirts. They do it without being asked.

I have heard good things about mulching with shredded leaves. Heard less good things about straw.

When do you start potatoes? and when do you harvest?
-Juli

According the info I have, in frost-free regions, potatoes can be planted anytime from early fall until midwinter for harvesting in winter and spring.

Young potatoes can be harvested whenever the tubers are large enough to be worth digging up--usually about the time blossoms appear, 7 to 8 weeks after planting.

This summer we tried growing potatoes for the first time. We had two big metal barrels and a bag of "organic" potatoes from the grocery store. The regular store potatoes are sprayed with something to deter them from sprouting, but the organic ones had little sprouts when we bought them. As a matter of fact, the grocery store discounted them since they had sprouted!!

Anyway, we cut them into pieces with an eye sprouted in each piece, and put them into about 6-8 inches of dirt. Every now and then we added leaves to the barrell as the potato plants grew upwards. Within a few weeks the plants were above the tops of the barrels. Then one day we went out there and found one of the barrels had NO plants sticking out, and as we got closer we saw a big fat possum sleeping in the barrel. Apparently he had gotten in but couldn't get out, and trashed the plants in the process.

The other barrel continued to grow but we weren't as diligent as we should have been adding leaves. (Hard to find fallen leaves in the summer around here.) We emptied out that barrell and found enough small spuds to fill a medium bowl. I cleaned them and put them in a pan and broiled them with butter and garlic - man, oh man, were they good!

We will try it again next year, but next time I think it would be better to mix the dirt with the leaves/mulch before planting the potatoes, and be more diligent about adding the mulch. The dirt at the bottom became very hard packed and digging them out was difficult - reaching way down there and digging at the same time without cutting into a spud. Next time I think we will also cover the barrells with a piece of fence or something to keep the critters out!!

Furry possum flavored potatoes, huh? LOL . That is such a funny story.

I think I will try the organic potatoes, too. I don't have a lot of leaves for mulching. We have very few trees in our neighborhood that drop their leaves in the fall. What I do have tons of is pine needles. Not sure if it's a good idea to use those or not. Do potatoes like acidic soil? I use them around my blueberries and hydrangeas but if I have to stick my hands in a pile of chopped up needles to find the little taters, I'd have to use gloves.

potatoes love acid. They can do 5.0. I'd try the needles if they don't have any alleopathic qualities.

Thanks, Zeppy. How would I go about finding out the alleopathic qualities of our pine trees? I'm not even sure what kind of pine they are. The hot Santa Ana winds just started to blow through today and lots of pine needles came down from our roof and the 5 trees. We also have a big Podocarpus which also sheds year round. Do you think I can also use those leaves?

We planted potaoes in old tires..The black holds heat and instaed of hilling,,we just put another tire on top and threw in some dirt/compost..Workt like a hot