Growing Potatoes Under Plastic Sheet

Water the area well.

Growing potatoes under plastic sheet.

Growing potatoes without digging. You want to make a lot of room for potatoes to grow under the plant. If your garden soil is very rocky put the seed potato pieces directly on the ground. Growing potatoes under black plastic 1.

Dig the garden plot where you will grow potatoes to a depth of 12 inches after all danger of frost has passed. I know they re not ideal. Mark out your bed cut down any weeds and cover with a sheet of black polythene. Rake the soil to create as level a surface as possible.

Stretch a 5 foot wide piece of clear 6 mil polyethylene sheeting along the support hoops. In each trench place a seed potato piece cut side down every 12 to 14 inches and cover with 3 to 4 inches of soil. Secure the ends and sides of the polyethylene sheeting with sandbags cinder blocks or other heavy items. Overlap adjacent sheets by at.

Anchor the sheet in place using large stones bricks or scaffolding planks or bury the edges in the ground. Also ducks can t get under a poly sheet hence the organically acceptable slug pellets we use. Plant the seed potatoes through the plastic at. Most weeds would die off anyway under the heavy mulch but this is a good way to ensure that the surface of the soil is loose.

Once the dirt was within two inches of the top we stopped because the plastic basket was beginning to buckle. You could also add a layer of compost on top. The sheeting tends to be thin and flimsy which can make it difficult to lay if there is any wind. I ve not been able to get to my potatoes to earth them up because of the incessant rain this part of scotland has had and now the haulms have closed the gap so i know i will have a fair proportion of greened tubers.

Problems with growing potatoes under black plastic sheeting slugs tend to like being under the plastic sheet and can badly damage the crop. Cover the garden plot with sheets of black plastic. This is an easy method method of growing spuds however as with any crop some ground preparation is necessary. After the potatoes sprouted they were growing so fast we added dirt to them pretty much every day.

Here s what to do. Hoe off the area where you want to grow your potatoes. Sprinkle with a mix of soil and compost. Cover them with straw or leaves hilling the material up as the potatoes grow.

Take precautions such as applying nematodes or scattering slug pellets along the row prior to sheeting up.