Potato hiller ideas

[billbill1]

Kuby, Troy Bilt makes a potato hiller for their rear tine tillers. I have never seen one but if you could located one to look at, it might give you some ideas on building one for your tractor. It basically is a tool to pull dirt onto the sides of the potato plants. Another method I have heard of but have never seen is to plant potatoes in an old tire. As the plant grows out of the tire, keep adding another tire and more dirt and allow the plant to grow out the top of that tire etc. When you are ready to start harvesting potatoes, remove a tire and dig the potatoes. When you want more. remove another tire. I have no idea if this works but it might be worth a try. The story goes that you will have potatoes all the way down to the bottom tire.

 

[billbill1]

Pete, great looking garden!!! So that's what a real garden looks like!! /forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif

 

[sassafraspete]

Bill, it would be a different picture if I were showing you this year's potato patch. You would see a lot of stems with leaves missing. If I could make money from selling colorado potato bugs, I'd be a rich man this yr. Nothing I do seems to have much effect on them.

 

[Rodney]

Sasafraspete, PM me and I can take care of your Colorada Potato Beetle. I also live in southern, In and possibly have met you at a Grower meeting. I plant a few 100 pound of potatoes, an acre of sweet corn along with a few 100 tomato plants.

I use a troy bilt hiller to hill the potatoes and a generic potato plow from TSC to plow them out.

The best potato planter is a Holland Old Fashioned planter, bought mine about 6 years ago for setting thousands of fruit tree root stock. Just so happens it works perfect for potatoes. 2 people ride and drop while one person drives my B2410.

 

[kensfarm]

"I too assumed a "hiller" would make hills, but the gadget photographed looks as if it splits hills. Does a hiller plant or harvest? "

The 3pt potatoe hiller I have consist of 4 disks on two bars.. it also has a shaper that forms/smoothes the hills' sides & top. The disks are set at an angle to gather the dirt into a hill.

I only use the middle buster (potatoe plow) to harvest w/.

We harvested two rows of Golden Yukon this past Sunday.. ended up w/ 6 bushel. Have some Red Pontiac's to dig up this coming weekend.. we are trying to get ready to plant again. There's 300lbs of seed potatoes in the barn we got for free.

 

[PineRidge]

This is available for the Troy Tiller. It can be used as a hiller/furrower and the wings can be adjusted or removed. I have seen several at eBay. I'm also thinking you might be able to adapt one for 3 point use.

 

[kuby]

Thanks for all the posts gents and that is a nice spud patch you have there pete. I was getting a bit confused on the middle buster for hilling but would be nice for harvest. Right now I use my rear blade to hill them when I have it in the dich digging position and use a one bottom plow to harvest. The rear blade requires a lot of room between rows so I just put in one long row and I have to use the shovel to get the dirt on top the hill more. You can see what I mean in the picture.

 

[sassafraspete]

Kuby, that dirt looks like it would grow some good potatoes. You definately could use the one row cultivator. We've had ours for years, but I know that I looked at one at a local TSC store this spring and it was less than $150 I think. I just went to their website, but didn't see one shown. With the cultivator, you just straddle the row with your tractor , with 3 tines (shovels) on each side of the row. The shovels are staggard back on each side, with the first 2 in front being closest to the row. They are usually adjustable. By going deeper and faster , you can throw more of a hill up, and can cover small weeds in the process. If your soil is clay like ours is, you can loosen up the soil pretty good with it. Sometimes we will till first with a troybuilt, then used the cultivator...as on this clay ground it tends to stick together and you end up tossing big clods of dirt on the plants. On a more sandy soil this wouldn't be necessary. Of course, when the potatoes get too big, or start blooming , then we stop using it. Planting rows side by side, you have to allow space for tractor wheels.

pete

 

[Deerlope]

Why don't you just look around for an old horse drawn one. I have walked miles behind a horse that was pulling one of them. Then just make it over to fit a tractor.

 

[OldMcDonald]

Why try to invent the wheel, if it already exists? I have described Harry Ferguson's way of doing it, and Rodney's post describes a very similar set-up for planting. You call them hillers in US, other parts of the world call them drill ploughs - a drill being the "hill" plus the furrow bottom either side. The words do not matter, but what does is an easy way to plant (we used to do about 5 acres) and lift the crop. Leave only the middle drill plough on the set-up for harvesting - the "middle buster" of other posts, and your job is done. I know it takes three people to plant, but the speed and quality of the work, potatoes just dropped down a tube and buried to your chosen depth in the middle of a hill (or drill if you prefer) and ridging up again later a piece of .... (some say "cake" others say other words). Finally lifting the crop is even easier. The two people that planted can also pick up. Of course, the tractor driver, is the tractor driver, is the tractor driver, is the.............................. Old Mcdonald.