POTATO TOWER...THE REVEAL!!

I want to try potatoes in the garden this year. This looks like a fabulous way to plant them.

Potato Skyscraper/Tower here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rGWZAIjsTU

POTATO TOWER...THE REVEAL!!: "

This is what it looked like when I first planted it...

This is at peak growing...

And this is just before I broke that sucka open. It really shrunk down.

It didn't exactly all fall out, like the guy said it would, but close enough. I could brush the soil away with my hands where the potatoes were growing.

I don't know if you can tell or not, but I raked about 2/3 of the soil back into the spot to compost over the winter. That way I'll have my first layer for next spring already there.

Here's my harvest. About 7#. Add to that about 5# we harvested earlier, it comes to about 12# or so. So, I doubled my input, 'cause I planted 6# originally. So It comes to about 25 cents a pound for fresh potatoes. That's not too terrible. I did expect a better harvest, but this is certainly better than the none I was able to grow in the ground before. Add to that no digging to harvest and I think we have a winner.

Here's my largest potato...

And here's the smallest!

So, to recap:

Pros

It didn't take up much space

It looked pretty good as an architectural planting

It was pretty maintenance free, except for watering and a couple of 'wheat' weeds from the straw

The harvesting was easy

I actually got a harvest

Cons

Not as good of harvest as I would have liked

I plan to do this again next year, but I think I'll skip the Kennebecs. We weren't real thrilled with them and prefer the Reds and Yukons.