# Trash Can Potatoes



## Davarm (Oct 22, 2011)

I was recently trying to come up with more ways to increase the gardens output and came across a number of articles on growing potatoes in "Trash Cans".

The idea was to keep adding soil to the container(as the plants grew) until it was almost full, this was supposed to increase the root growth and put on more spuds per plant than conventional planting. I ran across a person that said that they had done this and am supposed to see them sometimes next month and I am going to ask as many questions on it as I can, she said she had gotten as much 50 pounds per trash can with 3 or 4 plants per container.

I was also thinking instead of dedicating a "bunch" of trash cans to the endeavor I'd try lining "tomato hoops" with trash bags and using them instead, I have more than enough of them than I need for the tomatoes I'm going to plant this year.

I've tried to grow potatoes here in the past without much luck and thought it may be a good experiment to try.


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## weedygarden (Apr 27, 2011)

I will be curious to see how well this works for you.

We have lots of places to get 5 gallon buckets and I have considered using them. This could go a few ways. 

One way would be to just plant them in the bucket and keep filling it up with dirt as the plant grows.

Another idea would be to cut the bottom out of the bucket, plant the potato in the ground and put the bottomless bucket over the plant. Then keep filling up the bucket as the plant grows.


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## DKRinAK (Nov 21, 2011)

Tried that.

FAIL. Not enough sun got down into the can for the spuds to grow all that well.
Alasaka has funny sun angles so that may have been a factor. I would suggest using tires - just add a tire and more soil.

Good luck


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## moondancer (Dec 21, 2013)

I use old tires. I Kay a tarp down start with one tire as the plant grows add a tire and dirt at harvest flip over the tires


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## brightstar (Apr 24, 2012)

I had a fail on the trash can idea too. I got a few extra potatoes compared to the ground but they were all much smaller than the ground planted ones too.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

Another vote for old tires.

Avoid clay, spuds hate it, you will need sand or sandy loam.


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## goshengirl (Dec 18, 2010)

weedy, I did the buckets last summer. Fail. I mean, I got some potatoes, but it wasn't worth all the effort of getting the buckets, cleaning the buckets, drilling holes in the buckets... Not that any of that was hard work, just that it was a lot of effort for very, very little in the way of potatoes. (I'm planning to repurpose some of those buckets and cut their bottoms and do that mounding thing you mentioned - I've seen that, too, and I think more folks have had success with that - will have to find out  )


I'm not sure why the buckets were a failure, although I think drainage was a large part of it (even though I had lots and lots of holes drilled in the bottoms). So that makes me wonder how the trash cans will do. I will be curious to see how your experiment turns out, Dave!


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## rawhide2971 (Apr 19, 2013)

Tried it and it did not work out for me. Would love to figure it out and make it work--- And I had a heck of a problem with Ants getting in and making themselves at home. Fireants to be exact


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## razorback (Jul 17, 2012)

I tried using the round clothes basket method last year. I did just one since I didn't have many potatoes that had eyes growing. I got little pototoes. Not sure if I planted them to late and they died back to soon. I didn't want them on the grown cause we have terrible fire ants too.

I want to try using fence and make columns. I read on a blog you layer the outside with straw then add your dirt. 

I'm going to break down and order some pototoes this year so I have more to plant =D


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## dirtgrrl (Jun 5, 2011)

I tried the garbage can method a few years ago and failed as well. I suspect it was because the smaller soil mass in the can itself is subject to wide temperature and moisture fluctuations. In order to keep the can cool, I had to put it in the shade, and then it wasn't light enough for the leaves. In theory, the leaves are supposed to shade the can, but mine didn't grow that fast. So the next time I try potatoes I'll just make mounded raised beds. Have never grown potatoes so maybe it was other things that caused failure and I just didn't know any better.


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## GaryS (Nov 15, 2011)

Several years ago I read about stacking hay instead of dirt, but I never tried it. One year I did have some potatoes heavily mulched with hay and the tubers did grow in the hay, but it was never deeper than maybe 10", so not sure more would have worked. At least the hay would keep the stack cooler than dirt. I might just try a couple of plants like that this year.


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## Grimm (Sep 5, 2012)

I used the grow bags last year for my taters. I started them too late and only got large amounts of small tubers. I'm going to try again this year and see if starting them in March helps.


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## goshengirl (Dec 18, 2010)

My best experience growing potatoes was in a raised bed (4' x 60', 12" high) in soil that was freshly tilled in with a lot of leaves (from the previous fall). I didn't know anything about mounding up dirt at the time, just planted them deep.


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## LincTex (Apr 1, 2011)

GaryS said:


> Several years ago I read about stacking hay instead of dirt, but I never tried it. One year I did have some potatoes heavily mulched with hay and the tubers did grow in the hay,


do a 'net search for "hay bale gardening potatoes"... it's amazing but I don't like how much fertilizer is needed.


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## Locutus (Apr 24, 2012)

My first attempt with potatoes I buried the seed potatoes about 1 FT deep, then instead of earthing them up I surrounded each plant with a black garbage bag (with the bottom cut out) and proceeded to fill the bags with straw as the plants grew taller. ended up with plants over 4 FT high. This turned out to be a fail because inside the bags the plants simply vined. No spuds in the straw, only clusters of small spuds around the original seed potato.

The following year I tried something different. I made stacking 3' x 3' frames, each stack being about 11" high. These I filled with about 3 or 4 inches of soil, then the seed spuds, then another couple of inches of soil. I earthed this up as the plants grew, eventually with a total of about 22 inches of soil. Same result as the previous year, with clusters of small spuds around the original seed spuds. No spuds in the upper levels of soil.

This leads me to believe that earthing up the plants to encourage them to grow more spuds in the upper levels of soil is largely a myth. Well, at least it doesn't work for me.

So this year I'm trying something different. Instead of stacking my eight frames to make four 3' x 3' beds, I'm going to just go with 8 beds in single, 11" deep beds, planting the seed spuds about 5" deep. I will not earth these up, just let them grow as they will in that amount of soil and refrain from disturbing them except for watering. I might use a drip system to prevent damage from spray.


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## Davarm (Oct 22, 2011)

I'll try to keep this thread going and post my results, hopefully anyone else doing similar experiments can add to it too.


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## *Andi (Nov 8, 2009)

LincTex said:


> do a 'net search for "hay bale gardening potatoes"... it's amazing but I don't like how much fertilizer is needed.


I did the straw potatoes one year ... and it was a great year for the taters, as long as you don't mind the snakes. 

I use compost on top of the straw for fertilizer so that was not much of a difference for me. (but) The snakes that like it also keep me from doing it again. ~chills~

I've tried but never had much luck with the tires or garbage can ... it sounds great but in the end didn't work well for me. (sorry)


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