This is a brief report about my experience with two of my wooden framed beds. First post is here:
Using Raised Beds In Winter. The final result - success! I will do it again!
The idea was to find more space for making compost since my compost pile and composter were full already. All the usual materials - dry leaves, selected food leftovers, newspapers, egg cartons, weeds, finished perennials, etc. were used. Not all the ingredients were 100% rotten. I removed the bigger remaining pieces with a rake and my hands. But, most of the ingredients composted totally.
Since I was not sure if there were enough needed elements in the compost, one or a half of a garden soil bag was mixed in while a final preparation of the beds was made in spring.
Things for myself to remember:
- place smaller pieces of materials into the beds;
- stop adding tougher materials in early spring;
- never ever ever put potato rinds in the compost, UNLESS you want to grow potatoes there!
I did put some potato rinds in the raised beds. Then, in spring, I tried to get them out. Naturally, some of them remained uncovered and started sprouting in spring. I decided to leave several plants and voila! we had normal, middle to large size tasty potatoes!
I have potatoes growing in my garden from the store-bought potatoes which I planted just because they were not used in the kitchen and I wanted to show my kids that potatoes don't grow in a grocery store (here is the post
Back To Potatoes!) So, I have those potatoes growing already for the third season. Now, rind potatoes joined them. I think I'll never get rid of them and I don't want to!
Raised bed potatoes were EASY, since I didn't do any hilling. There is not enough soil and space there for hilling. Nevertheless, potatoes grew well! Here are some pictures.
Above: in August, the green potatoe plants on the back and fava beans in front of the picture.
I don't harvest all of the potatoes at the same time. Usually, I dig only as many potatoes as needed for dinner.
Above: If one of the smallest potatoes shown above is left in the soil, it'll start growing in the spring.
Above and below: The size of the potatoes was pretty big.
I also have Peruvian Purple fingerling potatoes. They also grow from the potatoes that I first planted in 2009. They are ready to be harvested while their foliage is still green.
In the next picture, you can see how dense is the fingerlings' foliage. The vines were up to 9 feet long. All the lower right quarter in the picture is taken by Purple Peruvian foliage with small white flowers:
I have already started to dump composting materials into one of the raised beds. To keep the raised beds looking tidy, I cover them with soil. Prior to that, I removed the upper layer of the soil and spread it around the garden.
***Copyright 2011 TatyanaS
