Remember these?

I have sandy soil and have had satisfactory results with far more shallow trenches. My rototiller was a small one that only went down 10". I'd till it up and rake the loose soil to the side. Place the seed and partially fill in, add fertilizer and cover some more. I'd till beside the trench on both sides and rake up more soil as they grew. It didn't really take a big hill to get results.

Thats how i do mine to Paul

Here's a picture of our taters under the orange fencing. We ran into a problem, we didn't get it moved quickly enough, got behind because of rain, so will probably recycle that as pea fencing and go to wire instead. Just easier to work with for a couple of non 25 year olds. LOL

DH is finishing up covering with leaves and straw as I type. I'll get more pictures later. The plants look good and are throwing some nice blossom for as late as we got started. I got new baby taters and fresh green beans with pearl onions in the back of my mind.........yummy!

Karen, I did exactly what you did with two of the tire 'towers'; I put that plastic fencing (just like doccat's) around the tires and filled in with straw. I haven't taken those down yet - just postponing disappointment, I think - but I've rummaged around in the straw enough to know there are no potatoes there.

I'm from MS and all the potatoes my folks grew were in ground so I know how it works. However, out here it's a different story: not enough room in the right places for a dedicated garden, hard-packed soil, blazing temperatures once we're past mid-June, sometimes mid-May. So, although I'd like to do things the way we did back home, it just isn't viable here.

Once the blast furnace begins to cool down, I may try yet another method: garbage bags. If I can figure out a way to keep the bags open, I can plant seeds in about 6" of dirt in the bottom and add dirt as the plants grow up. Of course, I could just as well get a garbage CAN and do it that way. ;) I just want fresh, home-grown potatoes - and peas and onions and .... I truly think I'm going to need a different climate if I'm going to have a successful garden. It has now been 110 degrees (up to 115) for 3 weeks in a row and there's no end in sight of these temperatures. YUCK!!!!

tomatofreak,

I've lived in Phoenix, so I understand your gardening problems. I didn't try to grow a garden when I was there as we were short-timers and renting while my then son-in-law was going to school at UTI. However, my brother has lived in Glendale for over 20 years. He used to raise veggies, and I'm almost sure he only grew them in the late fall/winter/early spring.

I thought you did the tires all the way up on all of yours. Like you, I haven't dug into the caged one that's still standing but I'm sure there are no potatoes anywhere except down in the tire on the bottom. I've read enough success stories to know that the tires can/should work. The only thing I can think of is that the summer temps are too hot for both of us. On the other hand, if that is the case then we should not have potatoes in the tires, which we do. It's a mystery to me. I'm thinking that I will get more tires and redo two of them with the tires, and do the third one with a modified cage using newspaper lining and dirt. I can't plant them in the ground either. Red, hard clay -- just like concrete.

doccat5,

Yours look great!

If this year's potato growing just simply will not work out, then I'll clear a patch and plant them spread out like you've done. I have the area, just not tillable soil. Besides, I don't want to dig 12-14" down to get the harvest. I'm way too far past 25 for that.

Karen

Humm, I planted my potatoes about 3 weeks ago, I am in AZ zone 8a 5300' elevation with max highs so far this year 105, but the average being in the 90's, lows in the 60's. My leaves are now about 6-8" and I plan on piling up on the plants with oatstraw and compost. I'll use newspaper and chicken wire if I need to. I planted late because I got excited with tomatoefreaks pics, ordered fingerling potatoes and they demanded to be planted or rot. Stay tuned and I'll let you know what the results will be.

Sonoita, please do keep us updated.

Guys, this is so diverse! So many different micro climates to factor in. Amazing, both successes and not so wonderful results! I still these methods are adaptable to your area with adjustments for your growing conditions.

For those of you in the "hot" zone and trying to grow in tires, I'm wondering if you painted the outside of the tires with a light color might help. I'm taking a guess that between the black tires drawing the heat and the continuous, intense high heat the seedlings are "frying" before they get a chance to get a good start. I'm still puzzled why you did not find some evidence of your seedlings when you pulled the tires. I'm going to bug my extension agent about that one, I'm suppose to be doing some help with admin work at the office with the other MGs. So it's on my reminder list of things to "ask Guy". LOL

Glendalekid you can turn that clay into great garden soil. I'd scratch it as much as I could and plant southern peas everywhere I wanted to improve. You have time for 2 crops to eat some or more if you just want green manure in your zone. The seed is cheap, they grow fast and then you take the lawnmower to the patch. Turn it under and plant again immediately. They grow well with minimal fertilizer. Let the weeds come too. Your soil microbes are working year round if it isn't bone dry. A couple years of this routine will perform a miracle. You can even save your seed from one planting to another and save that money. the old purple hulls or any other will do.

You can also dig a hole by whatever means and dump kitchen waste in it followed by a shovel of clay soil, repeatedly and next year you will have a prime tater spot. I learned these tricks struggling with GA red near Atlanta.

Hi twiggy,

Did mention that it's also planted with Devil Grass? I'm way too old (LOL) to be plowing and tilling, even though I know that really would be the proper way to get decent soil. I've been making raised beds and lasagna beds.

Karen

tomatofreak, please see:http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/870295/

Still rolling things around in my head as to maybe why you didn't get no potatoes.

Couple things I wondered. Did you bleach or sterile those tires before you used them. Tires when heated give off alot of toxic gases. dep[ening on where them tires came from they may have been treated with something.

Also, wondered when you put in your seed potatoes, did you treat them with a fungicide to stop rots and diseases.

Here a link and take a look at Black leg. Since you didn' thave any potatoes, made me think it might be a possible disease that causing you problems. You might want to compare your plant to the pics and see if it looks like it.

You had hot temps which is not good, but other folks it sems hve had luck doing taters in tires, so it makes me think that the problem could be a disease type thing. Could have been in the soil or the straw ya used .

Dah,.,, forgot the link

http://www.ag.ndsu.edu/pubs/plantsci/hortcrop/pp756w.htm

No, no! No fungicide...you can use sulphur to roll your cut seedlings in. It acts in the same manner as a fungicide and helps the cuts to heal over faster. Do it outside, it does not smell real wonderful. I'm an organic gardener.......no way I'm eating something that's been treated with fungicide, nor would I recommend it for anybody else.

The university labs do a wonderful job and are a great source of information, but they also only tout "nuclear" treatment of pests and diseases and there are other ways.

Doccat.. I am organic too. I use sulfur also, but wondered if she had treated hers. Just trying to see if maybe she did something that we have overlooked that could have caused the problem.

Another thing I thought is it might be worth it for her to take a sample of the soil to her local extention office and have them run a soil lab test to see what shows up in the soil. If ya take it through the extention office then it doesn't cost ya the 20 bucks for the test. The soil sample test might show if there was any toxic residue or whatevr in the soil that inhibited the taters growth.

Good idea, and she needs to let them know her problem. They may have some idea if this is common in that area.

For some of us the local extension office is 65 miles away. Not for tomatofreak, but it isn't always as easy as you make it sound ^_^

The problem tomatofreak and I are having is that potatoes were produced in the initial tires, but there was no production along the growing stems as the plants grew. Above the tires I had dry grass in wire cages. tomatofreak had stacks of tires, but also had cages and straw on some of them. This is where the mystery comes in -- theoretically we should have have had potatoes grow as well along those stems as we did in the bottom tires -- but we didn't have anything except rotted stems instead. Two different methods but neither worked for us. Both have worked for others, so why not this time?

As I understand it, for the tires to give off toxins, they must be heated to the point of actually burning them/setting them on fire.


Karen

In my area, they have you mail the soil sample to a lab. It's easy, fast, and they only charge $15. Got mine results today in an email and I'm sorting through what it says. They sent me a very nice 3-page report.

Here's the lab I used if you want to contact them: http://algreatlakes.com/lab_hom_law.asp

This message was edited Jul 2, 2008 11:04 AM

I am truly enjoying this discussion, although I'm no closer to figuring out what went wrong. As Karen said, there were plants - very healthy plants in my tires - that just kept growing up, beautiful and green. There wasn't a single sign that any plant was 'sick'. So I figured they were just busy as all get-out making potatoes along those pretty stems. Not till I got to the bottom tire did I find a single tater. And as you can see in the picture, they were pitiful.

I'm reading everything and I'm keeping all the suggestions here. So I will reconsider potato varieties, the source (although I was happy with the seed potatoes I got from Ronnigers), the soil, the placement of the tires, keeping track of soil temperature, monitoring water use (I guess I'll need one of those water meters on a very long stick!) - IOW, everything.

As Starlight says, other people get bunches of potatoes in tires; why can't I? We'll see. I can't wait to see how yours turn out, Sonoita! Didn't you and Jill start some about the same time? Or did you just order together?

We had plans to order together, TF, but it didn't work out--that "life" thing got in the way. And remember, my experiment with growing seed potatoes in new storebought bagged compost under straw was an even worse bust than you had--I didn't get a single thing. My current thinking is to try again in the fall; it might be that it's just too hot to do above-ground potatoes in the spring/summer months here. No incentive (or cues) for the plant to store any energy, maybe? Anyhow, I'm going to repeat my previous setup probably starting mid October, I'm thinking, weather depending. My Tucson planting guide recommends mid-September - mid- November, so I figure I'll split the difference.

I'm learning lots, too--hopefully with all these great minds and experienced potato-growers working on it, we'll get it figured out yet!

someone else said too much nitrogen is probably your problem. as I was reading over my soil test, I thought of this thread because it issues a warning in the fertilizing section:

Application of nitrogen in excess of the suggested amount could result in excessive growth of vegetation and poor yield of fruit for some garden plants.

sounds exactly like the tators in a tire situation.

Jill,

Summer heat in your area is always a consideration, of course, but then I'm in Zone 7b, same zone as doc, and started my potatoes at about the same time - soooo . . . why are my results just like TF's and not like doc's? I saw nothing to indicate a disease problem, and my soil was purchased bagged dirt with a PH very near to neutral.

indy,

Good thought, but I didn't add any fertilizer to my dirt in the tires nor to the grass above them.

TF,

I'm leaning more toward not enough nutrients in the bagged dirt or in the non-decomposing grass and straw. Doc, in using leaves, is using a medium that would be breaking down into additional nutrients as the plants grow. I saw where strawbaleman used the half-decomposed straw bales from his straw bale garden the year before and got terrific results. The decomposing straw would also provide additional nutrients. The others that I've seen who got good results were using potting soil, MG and such, instead of dirt, and some even added additional fertilizer or compost to this.

I've gone back and reread your earlier posts on this thread. It does appear to me that the non-decomposing matter (straw and dried grass) and purchased bagged dirt that we used to fill the tires and cages/baskets may not have provided enough nutrients to the growing stems. They tried -- but they couldn't produce. With all the differences in our growing areas and climates, this is the one thing I can see that we have in common but that is different from the folks who were successful. What do you think?

Karen

That was my next uestion is what kind of dirt did you use. I know it was bagged , but what kind.

Also, taters have to have good drainage. Once we find out what kind of soil ya used, it could be that it was just to heavy. It could also be that if the soil was too heavy and then it getting to hot, that all the good bacteria was killed off and let the bad bacteria flurish.

The other thing I am wondering about is nematodes in the soil. Wish the planty was still around and then you could take a magnifing glass and see if you could find any nematodes attached to the roots.

You can call the extension services and ask them to mail you out the small soil sample box or you cna just put some in a small box and send it off. Usually you cna find the uestioner form online. to include with the sample.

Potatoes don't like a high pH they do best at between a 4.8 to 5.4 pH ya definately don't want to over fetilize them with nitrogen.

Out of curiosity how long have your plants been growing. The tubers don't start to grow til about 30-60 days after planting and they usually not ready til 80 to 150 days after planting.

The reason I am asking is because there are two main diseases of potatoes and they would cause your plant to die also and you might then have thought that the potaoes were ready when they weren't.

Fusarium and Verticillum wilt are soilborne fungi that cause yellowing of the lower leaves that progrees up the plant and can cause premature death of the plant. Which is what I am thinking may have happened. A premature death since ya got leaves but no taters.

You could have possibly had the wilt and not known it and just thought your plant was done and ready for harvesting.

That would explain why others got taters and you few didn't cuz wilt is somethign that could affect anybody in any zone and any location.

The only other thing I cna remember is that the click beeetle or wire worm is very tiny and wil feed on the tubers and they wopuld eat them all and then start on the roots.

But the idea of a wilt seems more logical.

try again in august to replant them and I would fill your tires and plant your tater about 4-5" deep and only put some pinestraw on the top only.
Don't fertilize the plants until at least six weeks after the leaves have emerged and only give the plants one inch of water a week.

OK, last night I dug into two of my potato plants and this is what I found!!

You rock, Sonoita! Way to go!

How'd ya do it, huh?

Fingerlings ? Russian or Fin?

Fingerlings from organic supplier in Main. Dug a hole for eyes, added compost, once they got >8" I used straw & compost as a mounding agent. Voila!

I sure would like to find some seed potatoes now. It seems like it might be an ideal time to plant now that it's cooler and wetter. New potatoes for Thanksgiving dinner. What a treat!!!!

fiber - check the web, my seeds came from Wood Prairie Farm, Bridgewater, Maine www.WoodPrairieFarm.com

I have been checking but most places won't ship/can't ship cuz they don't have them/seed potatoes after the spring. I'll try this place that you suggested.
Thanks,
Kathy

I ordered potatoes from http://www.ronnigers.com/ and was very happy with them.

I heard back from Wood Prairie Farm and they won't even have seed potatoes for another 6-8 weeks so.... I'll try the other place, Sue, Thanks,
Kathy

Ronnigers is out, too. I got the last of them.

When I dig all my plants up, I will try to save some for the swap in November, but Tjill has first dibs on them.

Well, I can't get to the swap ... and I really wanted some right now to plant. I guess I'll just have to wait till March and then be better prepared next year.
Thanks though,
Kathy

I think Ronnigers will have stock again in about a month.

They will, Sue, but they won't be viable for another 6-8 weeks after that which puts me planting about 12-1 and it's just too cold here in January & the first part of February to grow much of anything that isn't covered, so.... I was just thinking that if I could plant them now, there would be new potatoes by Thanksgiving and that would be great. Not to be this year, I guess, unless I buy them somewhere.

Fiberholic, can you try some organic taters from the grocery store? Maybe not much in the way of variety, but you could at least get them started.

Sonoita, I'll only want a very few, so please feel free to offer to others as well--the more SW potato growers, the merrier! (And maybe the more ideas we can get about how to do this, since I know Tomatofreak and I both had bad results the first time around...) :)

Tjill - sure, however I really don't know how many I will have, hense the disclaimer.

Tjill, from what I know it takes 90-120 days after potatoes are harvested before they will grow. I would hope that the potatoes in the stores now aren't quite that old, but maybe they are. I will give it a try. Thanks for the idea.