Mulching potatoes with...?

[RJSchaefer]

We're using tires to grow potatoes. Lots of them. One of the local auto repair shops has taken to dumping their tires at the [abandoned] farm next door, so I have no shortage of them.


My potato plants are approaching 10 inches tall - time for a second tire. I need to mulch them. My yard soil is too compact to be used, and garden soil is expensive (going to need to a minimum of 12 tires, and that's not even counting the second batch of potatoes I haven't planted yet).

Here's what I'm thinking. A mixture of
- Rabbit bedding (soft pine chips, laden with bunny berries)
- The leftover peat moss
- Whatever I scoop up from the chicken coop cleaning (won't be much, includes chicken droppings and hay)
- Grass from mowing the yard
- The droppings/bedding that I already have composted
- The few bags of dirt I have left

I'm going to throw it all into 55 gallon barrels and have the kids roll it around the yard to mix. Then I'll use that and keeping adding as I clean.

I'm thinking that at the end of the season, when I lit all the tires, I can just throw the growing medium back into the barrels and remix.

Think this would work for potatoes? This is the first year I've tried growing potatoes in tires, and I didn't think far enough ahead.

 

[wyoDreamer]

I have read of just using straw/hay as a mulch and letting the plants grow up through that, but potatoes are heavy feeders so I would go as fertile as you got handy.

I use a mix that I make from a little garden dirt, peat moss, composted steer manure and mushroom compost. I don't have much dirt available to use either, put a little bit goes a long way in giving my mix structure. Try to get it as light as possible so the potatoes can grow easily.
Just my opinion, but I would save the grass clippings and compost them as much as possible before adding to the potato pile. I have had problems with green grass clipping added directly to growing areas without composting first. I don't know if it is the heat from the green material decomposing or the consumption of the nitrogen needed for the process, but the breaking down of the greens may hinder the growth of the potatoes. It is probably not a problem, but I am worried about the decomposing action on the green grass doing a decomposition of the new potatoes also ...
Everything else looks good though! Pile it all up and let it cook until it is needed for adding to the potato piles. Good compost will help for everything.

 

[RJSchaefer]

Yeah, people keep telling me to use straw. Straw is expensive. Rabbit bedding is free. I'm broke.

I'm a little worried about the grass clippings as well, but it would be a fairly small ratio. I may just put them in after I make the rest of the compost mixture, to give it another 6 weeks to start to break down before I need to add another tire.

 

[StephieSky]

All potatoes thrive in highly acid environments. The cast off bedding and grass muclches should work better than you might think, even without composting.
I can see how the tires will be great! They'll attract heat when its sunny and provide a pest barrier if you set down weedblock upside down.
I even have a set of four tires sitting in my garage I've been debating doing something with or breaking down and hauling them to the recycling center for someone else. Maybe I'll paint my tires with some sunflower stencils so they look pretty too.
I did a row run in ground under black plastic a few years back. OMG, what a joke. I don't know what I did wrong but the tops grew like weeds and the sets were itty bitty deformed little nubs infested with pests. Since moving I've stuck to my sweet taters in burlap bags.

Looks like i'm planting yellow taters again soon. Thanks!

 

[RJSchaefer]

The tires are awesome for taters, since you can stack and keep getting more vertical growth. I'm putting my money on this working. So it had better!

I'm also using tires for container. A dozen tires behind my barn that are growing - so far, spinach and potatoes are doing the best; squash and cukes, one measly sprout after 3 weeks; carrots and broccoli...lol. Nada.

Next up for planting in strawberries. I've heard strawberries like acidic soil, too, so I'm going to be using this composting mixture as the medium for the berries. Worse case scenario, they die.

I still have the concern about bacteria. Do I really want to eat berries grown in rabbit/chicken poo? Perhaps I'm too indoctrinated with germ-phobia.

 

[StephieSky]

" Do I really want to eat berries grown in rabbit/chicken poo? "


I do! I do! I want rabbits just for the poo lol I wish chickens pooped pellets. Truly I do. I love my hens but ... someone needs to breed a chicken that poops pellets! They'd be the Microsoft of the chicken world in no time.

 

[RJSchaefer]

Get just one. You'll have more than you know what to do with in no time.

We collected a 3 gallon bucketful (some hay and food mixed in, so maybe two gallons) in less than a week, just from 2 mini lops.

 

[StephieSky]

Just get one. You'll have more than you know what to do with in no time.

We collected a 3 gallon bucketful (some hay and food mixed in, so maybe two gallons) in less than a week, just from 2 mini lops.

Wow. Nice. My sweetheart is getting a rabbit soon. He doesn't know it yet, but my brain keeps working on the details of how to make it seem like the best idea ever.
And now he's specified no more animals unless they are agreed to BEFORE I bring them home so I have to do this carefully.
My cat pooped on his bed pillow just the one time. No clue why ... they NEVER have accidents in the house! It was just so weird. And then I brought home two unhealthy hens that poop on his breakfast patio. He says my "pet picker" is broken lol I have to convince him about the bunnies before I go get them. The hens are growing on him. He smiled when I pestered him until he fed them treats yesterday

 

[RJSchaefer]

I just had to tell my sweetie by the end of the summer he'd be having rabbit for dinner.

We got 5 strawberries planted. I need to send the man for more tires tonight, to stack up the taters. He HATES tire runs, because (he says) "it's more work than (I) realize". Oldest DD and I did the first tire run, with a kids' wagon. He at least can use his truck!!

Instead of mixing the grass into the mixture, we used it as a barrier against the tire. For the potatoes, we wrapped the tire in black plastic (garbage bags). That was a pain in the

. This time, I just stuffed the wells of the tires with dried grass clippings.

One of the strawberries in its new home.



And here are the potatoes, definitely ready for a second tire!


I still find it kind of strange that you just entirely cover them and they keep growing. My spinach wouldn't stand for that!

In retrospect, I need to unstuff the tires I already filled with grass, and hose them down. They've been sitting out in the sun and been rained on MANY times, so I'm sure they're clean, but that extra caution couldn't hurt...

 

[chocbantamorps]

I don’t know if you have heard about the controversy about toxins leaching from old tires. There seems to be proof both ways. I have included four websites I found on the Internet that talk about this topic but you are welcome to look at other sites too and form your own opinion.


http://5400squarefeet.blogspot.com/2009/02/tires-in-garden-cadmium-zinc-toxicity.html

http://containergardening.about.com/od/greencontainergardening/f/Are-Tire-Gardens-Safe.htm

http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/cornucop/msg0514124322682.html

http://tennzen.blogspot.com/2009/05/ask-tennzen-is-it-safe-to-grow-veggies.html