Growing potatoes in those sack things?

[eieio]

Is an ordinary general purpose compost ok? Or should I go for something else and also should I add a fertiliser of any kind? If so can you please recommend? My first earlies have chitted very well so are all ready to go!

[rustylady]

Potatoes do much better in open ground. Do you really have to grow them in containers?

[eieio]

I don't have to grow them in the containers, I can put them in the allotment - I was going to try both methods as I have enough to cover both container and ground.

[gillian62]

I have put mine in a container bag, and added compost to them, just normal multi-purpose compost.

[BUFFS]

Is an ordinary general purpose compost ok? Or should I go for something else and also should I add a fertiliser of any kind? If so can you please recommend? My first earlies have chitted very well so are all ready to go!

i grow mine in tubs/sacks each year(no room in limited veg patch) and put some potato fertiliser or chicken pellet manure on them two weeks before sowing and get a reasonable crop each year,i have only ever used old multipurp compost,with no obvious problems...i double the amount of water as and when they flower and continue with it from then on,as im by the sea,i can put my pots onto seaweed in the tubs,giving them a taste like jerseys or ayrshire spuds..well worth it.

[selfraising]

I grow mine in the ground and in containers adding fertiliser to general multi purpose compost. They have done fine the last couple of years just require more watering

[Glutton4...]

I did both last year, as I bought far too many seed potatoes for the available ground. This year I will be doing both again, as I didn't actually grow enough for our needs!!! I will feed more, and water more this year - we had a very hot dry summer in Essex last year (sorry to those that didn't)!

[Twinkle]

At school we're growing them in old compost sacks - 5 teams, 1 seed potato and one bag per team with a prize for the highest yield by weight.
Filled the bags about a quarter full with really old cow-manure shovelled out of a derelict byre (about 5 years old and super-crumbly) then top them up with multi-purpose compost.

[organic]

I'll be doing both.
I've got 1st and 2nd Earlies and Late Maincrop along with a small sample of another 1st Early, another Late Main and two Salad spuds... unless I'm missing one. There are ten tubers of each "sample" variety. and between 20 and 30 of each of the main varieties.

I counted them up and have 129 in total. I would need to dedicate about a quarter of my normal beds to growing spuds to put them all in there! I'll be sticking a few in bags or tubs I think... heck I might even guerilla-garden a few of them just to see how they get on, if they get weeded out and if there's a harvest to get at the end... because "why not"?

I was going to get an early maincrop too but considering how many I have already, I don't think I will. We'll see.