Planting Potatoes in Used Tires Helps the Environment as Well as the Gardener
That time of year comes around and April showers begin to dampen
the soil. All the gardeners have talked and guessed on a week that they
think the last frost has come and gone, allowing them to plant their
potatoes. The old, more common method is to dig a trench in the ground,
plant part of a potato with roots in it (or a whole potato with roots),
and cover it up. Then, water and compost the bed, gradually raising it
up around the base of the plant as it grows. This process takes around
70 days before the potatoes are ripe and ready to harvest.
There
is a more convenient way of growing potatoes, though, that is less time
consuming, environmentally friendly, and causes less strain on the body
of having to bend over. Growing them out of old, used tires. Just mix
some good soil and manure about 50/50 and lay a tire on the ground in
your new garden. Place a few potato pieces in it (make sure they have
been sitting in the dark, growing roots) and cover them with compost. As
the plant starts to grow above the tire, stack another one on top of it
and gently add some more compost, gradually raising up the bed. Soon,
you will have a stack of tires filled with soil, compost, and if done
correctly, a bunch of potatoes!
Once your potato plants have
produced flowers they have started to die and fall off, it is time to
harvest them. You may want harvest one of your stacked beds a little
early just to see if they may be ripe sooner than expected. The time to
harvest may vary depending on the area and climate. Some people like to
eat small potatoes, too. Just take off the top tire and work your way
down until potatoes will start to come falling out. You can also add
more potato pieces with roots as the stack gets taller, or even cut
holes in the tires for the plants to grow out of.
While some
people use different mixtures of soil and compost, I have found manure
to be essential in the soil where I live. I try to mix it at least half
and half, and there are other mixtures as well as different organic food
you can add to your compost to help potato plants to grow, such as fish
carcasses. So, get out your old used tires and get ready to harvest
buckets full of potatoes this Summer!
