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Emumundo's avatar

There was a substacker, Ratio Bradbornius, who was putting together a potato “challenge”. Grow enough potatoes for your family for a year and grow extra potatoes to be given away. Never sold, only given away. Sadly, one day his substack was just gone and everything had been scrubbed. Being Irish, I thought this was a great idea. My mothers family first came to this country during the potato famine. I just need to look up the logistics of growing potatoes in Florida. I know they grow a lot of potatoes in Hastings, maybe I’ll head over there.....

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Karmy's avatar

There is a farmer in a nearby town here in SW Montana who plants a field of potatoes and every year the second Saturday of October everyone can come harvest the potatoes for free. No limits. He uses his tractor to bring the potatoes to the surface and you pick as much as you want. It’s really cool to see kids picking the potatoes out of the field and putting them in their buckets.

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MaryAnn's avatar

❤️❤️❤️ this! As a young married couple we planted a few potatoes. I loved digging out the smaller ones, and leaving some to grow larger. It was like treasure hunting. 😍

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ViaVeritasVita's avatar

My SE Pa veg garden is very very productive in just about everything. However, potatoes I have trouble with. Soil has pH of 6.8-6.9--way too sweet for potatoes, but dandy for most other vegetables. I'm trying growing potatoes among my blueberries, where soil has been maintained (sulfur) down below 6. Don't know what Florida soil is like, but worth looking into (state ag uni will do soil test)

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ItsMeAgain's avatar

We use containers so we can "make" the soil just right.

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PamelaZelie's avatar

Been trying Kratchy hydroponics, with the advice of a neighbor, and the lettuce and tomatoes are doing amazing! Much better than my pitiful soil garden.

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SteelJ's avatar

I'm skeptical of hydroponics. I know it works to grow healthy-looking plants with good yields. But where are the trace minerals, and all the micronutrients we haven't even discovered yet, going to come from when you grow without real soil?

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Karmy's avatar

I have grown potatoes in 5 gal buckets and cardboard boxes. Both work amazingly well.

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carily myers's avatar

I'm growing mine in buckets as we speak. (in SC)

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Fed up's avatar

That’s interesting about your potato experience. I live in a Province known for their potatoes - soil is acidic and probably under 6 pH since wild blueberries grow everywhere and regular blueberries do well too. We have trouble growing potatoes here. When I lived out west where the pH was over 8, no problem with potatoes. I always added superphosphate when planting. No scab either.

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SteelJ's avatar

We grow regular potatoes, but for us, sweet potatoes work even better. For some reason we're able to keep them longer. Just finished the last of those we dug last fall, as firm and fine as when we dug them. Our regular potatoes get soft and eventually inedible in storage.

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Carlos's avatar

Hopefully you can teach me how to grow potatoes in south Florida

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Lisa Ca's avatar

I love this too Emumundo.

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