Trash Can Potato Question

[Red Horse]

I tried growing potatoes in a trash can this year and they did ok. I used some soil and some straw, and they only grew into the soil layer, so I won't do that again. My question is, should I top the plants? I knew I would need to wait till the tops died to harvest, but mine grew so tall they fell over and spilled out of the trash can (I built up the straw clear up to the rim of the can) well before they even grew flowers. I used grocery store Yukon golds that I chitted and dunked in wood ash, then left to dry and sprout.

 

[WhiteCollarWeezy]

Potatoes are very tricky to grow. Im kinda thinking your trash can may be to tall. From my experience its better for the roots to grow out than down. We use a Rangeland tub, like a 'Lick" tub for cattle, worked quite well this past year. used a hole saw to drill 4 holes around the base of rangeland tub. Got seed potatoes from feed store, yukons and red potatoes from local grocery store. The seed potatoes did the best but the others grew also. Shouldnt have to top your plants it you use a wider tub, not so long.

 

[Acre4Me]

Depends on the variety. Like tomatoes, potatoes can be “determinate” or “indeterminate”. So, a determinate type will not need to be topped up so it can grow more potatoes bc it won’t grow more than one level of potatoes. An indeterminate can produce more if it gets more soil piled up as it grows. One year I had purchased seed potatoes from an online vendor. I learned that potatoes could be determinate or indeterminate so asked the company which type I’d purchased. They told me and I only mounded dirt on one variety, which was the indeterminate type.

We’ve had a couple potato varieties grow fairly tall, others stay kind a short. I’ve also read to pinch off the flowers do they put energy into the tubers and not into the flowers.

 

[Red Horse]

Depends on the variety. Like tomatoes, potatoes can be “determinate” or “indeterminate”. So, a determinate type will not need to be topped up so it can grow more potatoes bc it won’t grow more than one level of potatoes. An indeterminate can produce more if it gets more soil piled up as it grows. One year I had purchased seed potatoes from an online vendor. I learned that potatoes could be determinate or indeterminate so asked the company which type I’d purchased. They told me and I only mounded dirt on one variety, which was the indeterminate type.

We’ve had a couple potato varieties grow fairly tall, others stay kind a short. I’ve also read to pinch off the flowers do they put energy into the tubers and not into the flowers.

Well that explains a lot!!! The second variety I planted did the same thing and when I looked it up, determinate. I'll try planting in a long, low trough next year! For the indeterminate varieties, I kind of want to try the straw trash can again and see if it works with a potato that's actually meant to produce upwards.

 

[akroberts1085]

All of this is very interesting to me. I tried growing potatoes last year in the ground and got a couple of decent medium sized potatoes but more of them were small. The year before last I used a grow bag and nothing except small potatoes not even big enough to eat.

 

[BigBlueHen53]

I heard of a method where you fill up a tire with dirt and plant your poratoes in it. When the plant flowers, add a tire, fill it with dirt. When the plant outgrows the second tire, do it again. Keep it going and growing and you should end up with a tower of potatoes. I've always wanted to try it but ... I don't have tires and I don't have dirt! Would love to hear if it works.

 

[nao57]

I tried raised beds for growing potatoes and they didn't do well. They seem to not like having the roots warm up too much. This is why I don't think it works very well to grow in containers. Although I wish it could work.