Middlebusters - am I missing something?

[Barneyhunts]

How do you "keep" that many potatoes? Do you leave them in the ground until you need them?
Thanks

 

[Bill Barrett]

hey, check out how these guys modified a middlebuster for digging potatoes:

Three Point Attachments for Horse Drawn Tool Carts, Power Carts and Horse Drawn haying Equipment :: I & J Manufacturing - Gap, PA

Should work, especially in lighter or drier soil. Would be an easy job to modify a 16" middlebuster shovel. Cheap, too.

Nice link, how the heck do horses pull the finish mower and tiller?

 

[ChuckinNH]

Nice link, how the heck do horses pull the finish mower and tiller?

I didn't follow the link, but I would think that the PTO hookup would be more of a problem than the pulling part.

 

[Eastinlet]

How do you "keep" that many potatoes? Do you leave them in the ground until you need them?
Thanks

Nope, just dig them up and sack them and move them out of the field. I then disk and plant rye to protect the ground and grab any excess nitrogen.

The big growers move their stuff to market as fast as they can and put the remainder into atmospherically controlled storage.

The produce we grow is for the community, we feed the needy and elderly. We get sacks of potatoes to our customers who can use large quantities, i.e. families, at harvest time, eliminating the need to store. Then we have a fairly efficient method of distributed storage whereby the sacks go to volunteers who have either cold or warm cellars. The warm cellar potatoes get bagged into smaller bags and are taken around by volunteers with the objective of using them up by Christmas. The cold cellars can keep the remainder in good condition for distribution through spring.

 

[ChuckinNH]

The produce we grow is for the community, we feed the needy and elderly. We get sacks of potatoes to our customers who can use large quantities, i.e. families, at harvest time, eliminating the need to store. Then we have a fairly efficient method of distributed storage whereby the sacks go to volunteers who have either cold or warm cellars. The warm cellar potatoes get bagged into smaller bags and are taken around by volunteers with the objective of using them up by Christmas. The cold cellars can keep the remainder in good condition for distribution through spring.

That's a good plan. I am going to look into doing that this year since I can't use much of my produce alone. I've also thought about seeing if there were any of those folks who would like to garden, and let them use some of my space. Not sure how to go about that though. I admire your efforts, and thoughts.

 

[Eastinlet]

That's a good plan. I am going to look into doing that this year since I can't use much of my produce alone. I've also thought about seeing if there were any of those folks who would like to garden, and let them use some of my space. Not sure how to go about that though. I admire your efforts, and thoughts.

Chuck -

Anyone interested can PM me if they would like to know more about community gardening. I'd be happy to share our experience with anyone caring about their community. There are a number of ways to go about this, and it pays to consider alternatives before beginning a project.

There are ways to pool resources and labor to make large gardens possible.

Don't want to stray too far off topic in this thread.

 

[charlz]

As for irrigating potatoes, I have my gardens on drip. I have dug a nice deep trench (hiller behind the tiller), lay in the drip hose (had about 12" spacing on the emitters) cover that with about 3 inches of soil. Run the water a bit and drop the seed potatoes on the wet spots and cover. I hilled as normal and come harvest time was able to yank the drip hose up out of the ground and then hand dug the potatoes. The drip runs daily and I was afraid of too much moisture. Our soil does drain well though and at harvest I did not have any rotten potatoes.

 

[Eastinlet]

As for irrigating potatoes, I have my gardens on drip. I have dug a nice deep trench (hiller behind the tiller), lay in the drip hose (had about 12" spacing on the emitters) cover that with about 3 inches of soil. Run the water a bit and drop the seed potatoes on the wet spots and cover. I hilled as normal and come harvest time was able to yank the drip hose up out of the ground and then hand dug the potatoes. The drip runs daily and I was afraid of too much moisture. Our soil does drain well though and at harvest I did not have any rotten potatoes.

Are you running drip or microdrip, such as T-tape?

I've been thinking about trying micro for the field, maybe every other row the first year and compare yield to see if it pays.

The stuff is actually pretty cheap, I think around $200-250 for 10,000 feet of 6 mil. The 6 mil is basically throwaway stuff, and that's fine since my digger will damage it. Doesn't take much flow or pressure to irrigate either, it won't handle more than about 15 PSI. I called trickle-eez, one of the major suppliers and spoke with a capable guy who was able to answer my questions. I'm thinking hard about trying it for mid-summer when it gets so dry.

 

[charlz]

I just use the 5/8 poly and put emitters in it. I tried the stuff with emitters already in it but didn't really care for it. This was I can easily change out emitters if they clog and build my own lines with whatever spacing I want.