The first few years we grew potatoes on our veg plot in this garden they were amazing. We got some huge potatoes and they were particularly good for roast potatoes and chips.
The next few years they were full of wire worms. It got a bit worse each year until by the time I had cut out all the wormy bits we were left with bits of potatoes the size of marbles.
This year as an experiment we decided to try growing them in potato bags in the hope that they wouldn’t get wire worms.
Potato bags in June
The growth looked really healthy. As the growth spilled out of the bags it hit the ground then turned to grow upwards again. There was plenty of growth on the potatoes throughout the summer.
As always we waited for the green to die away before harvesting the potatoes. I let our shop bought potatoes run out, ha ha, before harvesting the first bag.
Potato bags
We had three bags but I forgot to take the photo until we had emptied the first bag.
Well …. disappointed doesn’t really go far enough!
The entire crop from one bag
This was all of the potatoes in one bag in an old washing up bowl. The bigger potatoes had rotted and the smallest potatoes were from the size of a grape down to the size of a current.
When I pealed them I needed to take a thick layer off as they seemed to be rotting from the skin inwards. The biggest ones had rotted all the way through and the others had rotten patches on the skin but were okay inside. The smallest ones had to be thrown away as they too small to do anything with.
The entire crop of one bag once pealed
This is a pudding basin and these potatoes will just about do three meals for the two of us and we eat fairly small meals. On the positive side, they didn’t have wire worm! I think we can conclude that we won’t be bothering with this method again.
We put the compost in the run for the girls.
Compost emptied into the run
We went through it with our hands and then a fork as potatoes are poisonous to chickens, although they do usually avoid anything that is poisonous, but we don’t want to take any chances.
The girls scratch and spread the soil
The little girls have their turn
At least the compost will help to build up the soil level in the run. We won’t bother with growing potatoes in bags again and will probably just put them back in the ground next year. You have to try these things but I am going to call this experiment a failure.
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Oh, thanks for sharing. I was considering growing potatoes in bags. But we don’t eat very many and I had to question if it was really worth the effort. I’d much rather have carrots, beets and radishes which we love.
I have to say that it really wasn’t worth the effort and the money spent on bags, compost and seed potatoes would buy many, many, bags of shop bought potatoes that would be much easier to prepare.
I think in our experience, beans and leaks are the most productive, followed by courgettes and tomatoes plus any salad produce, and as you say, radishes always do well and sometimes spinach has done well. It is lovely to eat produce from the garden but potatoes grown in a bag are a “no” from me!
We grew potatoes earlies, this year, we grew them in the grownd, we had a good crop,lasted us over two months,Ashley gave us a bag to grow some in, ours were hopeless, Ashley only put 4 potatoes in his bag and he had a really good crop. We think we overloaded ours, but we would not grow them in bags again. You do grow them in a different place every year?dont you.
At least the girls enjoyed themselves,a treat for them.
When we grow them in the ground we always rotate and grow all our crops in a different place each year. I think we may have overloaded our bags. We put about six to eight seed potatoes in each bag. I wonder if that’s what the problem was. We are going to try a different type next year. Perhaps we should try earlies. We may also try something like fur apple’s which Jackie always did well with. It’s all a learning process. As you say, the girls enjoy the compost.