Potato Potato Potato
Nov. 10th, 2019 10:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
unicorndukeAs always happens when I harvest potatoes, I think of this song.
This was all yesterday. I knew the piece of equipment that I needed to dig the potatoes but it had a bar mounted instead of the sweep it should have been so I texted dad about it. He was off helping set concrete so slow to get back to me. While I was waiting, I ran down to my field, picked up all the stuff, fencing, flags, plastic and set it off to the side. By then, dad texted me where the sweep was so I could get that all set.
I went and got all three rows (~150 feet each) busted and the video is here. That was right around noon and I went for lunch. This was an excellent idea on my part. We got a hard freeze the night before and it did freeze some of the shallower potatoes. The soil was still in chunks at the top when I went through with the middle buster. After lunch, I started picking up potatoes and since they had sat in the sun for a bit, all the potatoes that had frozen thawed just enough that they went mushy and it was very easy to tell which had frozen and could be tossed.
I had a mix of potatoes planted in two rows, leftovers from work. Somehow the potatoes that did the best in my neglectful conditions were the fingerlings, so now I have probably 1/4 fingerlings when there was two varieties out of 20 that went into the mix. All total, I ended up with two bushels of potatoes, which is not a great amount for the amount I put in except for the fact that they were free potatoes. All they cost me was planting, hilling and harvesting time. I did play a decent amount of the thrilling game of "potato or rock" which is a game you play when you plant blue potatoes.
(those are half bushel baskets so it is slightly less impressive than it looks)
Looks like I never posted about getting the garlic in the ground. To be fair, October was nuts. I ended up with 26 pounds of uncracked garlic so I planted out four rows in one bed at 6in x6in spacing and the bed was 200 feet long. One weekend I rototilled, planted and just raked some dirt over the blubs and spread straw the next weekend. I went deep on the rototilling so it was a nice bed to push the garlic into. I found it easier to plant and spread straw than to do black plastic mulch like I did last year. There might be a little more weeding needed but this wasn't bad. I sold 150 of 170 heads that I grew last year with only the smallest ones not selling. We'll be changing displays and things up next year so they will definitely sell. People were very excited about it.
This was all yesterday. I knew the piece of equipment that I needed to dig the potatoes but it had a bar mounted instead of the sweep it should have been so I texted dad about it. He was off helping set concrete so slow to get back to me. While I was waiting, I ran down to my field, picked up all the stuff, fencing, flags, plastic and set it off to the side. By then, dad texted me where the sweep was so I could get that all set.
I went and got all three rows (~150 feet each) busted and the video is here. That was right around noon and I went for lunch. This was an excellent idea on my part. We got a hard freeze the night before and it did freeze some of the shallower potatoes. The soil was still in chunks at the top when I went through with the middle buster. After lunch, I started picking up potatoes and since they had sat in the sun for a bit, all the potatoes that had frozen thawed just enough that they went mushy and it was very easy to tell which had frozen and could be tossed.
I had a mix of potatoes planted in two rows, leftovers from work. Somehow the potatoes that did the best in my neglectful conditions were the fingerlings, so now I have probably 1/4 fingerlings when there was two varieties out of 20 that went into the mix. All total, I ended up with two bushels of potatoes, which is not a great amount for the amount I put in except for the fact that they were free potatoes. All they cost me was planting, hilling and harvesting time. I did play a decent amount of the thrilling game of "potato or rock" which is a game you play when you plant blue potatoes.
(those are half bushel baskets so it is slightly less impressive than it looks)
Looks like I never posted about getting the garlic in the ground. To be fair, October was nuts. I ended up with 26 pounds of uncracked garlic so I planted out four rows in one bed at 6in x6in spacing and the bed was 200 feet long. One weekend I rototilled, planted and just raked some dirt over the blubs and spread straw the next weekend. I went deep on the rototilling so it was a nice bed to push the garlic into. I found it easier to plant and spread straw than to do black plastic mulch like I did last year. There might be a little more weeding needed but this wasn't bad. I sold 150 of 170 heads that I grew last year with only the smallest ones not selling. We'll be changing displays and things up next year so they will definitely sell. People were very excited about it.
