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As the planting season approaches I thought I would give you a quick guide to how I would grow potatoes in containers.
What you will need- 3/5 seed potatoes
A container
Multi-purpose compost
45grams of fertilizer from any good garden store
Start off by using a clean container and mix your fertilizer into the compost you are going to use. Most containers will be 30-40 litres for this guide if they are bigger add 15grams of fertilizer to every 10litres of compost.
Now simply fill the bottom 4 inches of your container with your newly mixed compost and add your potatoes to it. Try and evenly space your potatoes out in the container and gently push them half way in.
Add a further 2 inches of compost ontop of the potatoes so that they are nicely covered.
Now comes the shocking part DO NOT water them for a week!!
Yes I can hear you saying that I am crazy but the compost will contain moisture and what we want is the root system to go down into the bottom 4 inches and establish a good root system. Watering straight away will encourage the roots to go up the way.
Watering is key with potatoes and a small amount every day is better than a big amount once a week. Never saturate the compost as this will do more harm than good. Moist is the key word here.
As the potatoes grow and the shoots appear simply keep adding more of you pre-mixed compost to your container to cover the potatoes but allow the shoots to grow by not adding too much compost and cause compaction.
The main thing to avoid is compacting the compost as this will slow the growth of the potatoes as you will create unhealthy anaerobic conditions.
Your average first early will be ready in 9 weeks in ideal conditions.
I think that should cover it for you.
I will make a video soon for you all to watch
VIdeo is now done.
What you will need- 3/5 seed potatoes
A container
Multi-purpose compost
45grams of fertilizer from any good garden store
Start off by using a clean container and mix your fertilizer into the compost you are going to use. Most containers will be 30-40 litres for this guide if they are bigger add 15grams of fertilizer to every 10litres of compost.
Now simply fill the bottom 4 inches of your container with your newly mixed compost and add your potatoes to it. Try and evenly space your potatoes out in the container and gently push them half way in.
Add a further 2 inches of compost ontop of the potatoes so that they are nicely covered.
Now comes the shocking part DO NOT water them for a week!!
Yes I can hear you saying that I am crazy but the compost will contain moisture and what we want is the root system to go down into the bottom 4 inches and establish a good root system. Watering straight away will encourage the roots to go up the way.
Watering is key with potatoes and a small amount every day is better than a big amount once a week. Never saturate the compost as this will do more harm than good. Moist is the key word here.
As the potatoes grow and the shoots appear simply keep adding more of you pre-mixed compost to your container to cover the potatoes but allow the shoots to grow by not adding too much compost and cause compaction.
The main thing to avoid is compacting the compost as this will slow the growth of the potatoes as you will create unhealthy anaerobic conditions.
Your average first early will be ready in 9 weeks in ideal conditions.
I think that should cover it for you.
I will make a video soon for you all to watch
VIdeo is now done.
..jacob
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