Input on Potato Tower

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Trixi Agrios
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This year I’d like to add Potato Towers made with wire, soil, compost and straw to the garden. I’ve grown potatoes in soil and bags before but am under the impression that by layering seed potatoes this way I can increase the yield. Does anyone have experience with growing potatoes this way and would care to comment? Thank you.
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Potato tower
Potato tower
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Danoost
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I don't have experience with potato towers so I can only share what I know about growing them in the field. From here I'll try make conclusions for what will work in towers for maximum yield.

For field grown potatoes we plant in a furrow around 3-5" deep. When the potato emerges to around 3" and forms it's first leaves, we begin to mound them. We repeat this process until the potato hill is as high as possible--around 18". Hilling does three things: increases production, reduces weeds and prevents green potatoes.

By mounding, potatoes will form along the entire underground root stem. if the portion underground is 20" long, potatoes can potentially form along that entire root. That's why mounding is critical. People have also used tires to grow potatoes vertically in this fashion by adding a new tire as the potato grows until you're 3 or 4 tires high.

In a tower such as the one you're showing, I see that the leaves of the potato would come out the sides. It's hard to determine from the picture but it looks as if the potatoes are crowded too closely together. In the field we plant potatoes 12-18" apart. In a tower that is 2' across I'd add no more than 4 potato seeds on each layer.

I'm interested to hear from people who have used this tower successfully.
Trixi Agrios
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Thanks Dan, I am going to grow potatoes three ways this year; in ground, grow bags and the tower, and will document my progress and success. It is all about maximum yield in the space we have.
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