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[EarthNSky <erthnsky AT bellsouth.net>]

When I do it, I plant 4-6 seed potatoes in a tire, depending on the size
of the tire.  You could probably put more in there, but that's what I
do.  Add a bit of soil, and hay/mulch/straw/compost.  When the potato
shoot emerges from the soil and grows up about 6 inches, add another
tire, and fill it with hay/mulch etc. like before, leaving 2-4 inches of
the potato vine to grow uncovered.  As the vines grow, add tires and
mulch.  I make them 5 or 6 tires tall, but depending on your height, you
may want to use fewer.  You can easily get maybe 25-30 pounds of spuds
out of 4-5 tires.  I had a 6 tire stack once of red pontiacs that
yielded 50 pounds....lots of taters!  You can add a shovel or so of soil
to the hay-inoculate it with bacteria from the soil to get it decomposing.

As to the sweet potatoes, I was always a William Faulkner fan, and my
favorite Faulkner book was/is As I Lay Dying..of course, my favorite
character was "My Mother is a Fish", Vardaman.  So that's why I chose
that variety...lol
I grew a sweet potato in my mulch bed this year that was larger than a
football.  I thought it might be mushy or pithy, but it wasn't-it was
excellent!  We made French fries.  I just stuck a slip in the hay mulch
last April and then 'forgot' it..I had looked around, but did not see
the sweet potatoes
I went to pull up the vine out of the bed so that I could top off that
bed with additional hay, when it felt like I had hooked a huge fish.
Digging down, there was the monster sweet potato along with a smaller
one that I still have.  It's the size of a quart mason jar or a Texas
sized baking potato.  I don't have to tell you that things are always
bigger out there..lol

Bev

eureka AT hctc.net wrote:
> So you think the potato problem was more about soil texture than the
> alkalinity of the water? Using the tire stacking method, how many
> plants per tire, and what kind of harvest can I expect?
>
> On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 13:29:04 -0500 EarthNSky <erthnsky AT bellsouth.net>
> wrote:
> > I tried Vardaman the first year I grew them.  Mine weren't very
> > sweet either.  Nowadays, I just save and grow slips from year to
> > year.  I have no idea of what variety-just something I bought from
> >  from the store about 4 years ago.
> >
> > Sage, grow potatoes in tires with hay or straw and compost.  If you
> > do that, you don't have to worry about the soil.
> >
> > eureka AT hctc.net wrote:
> > > We harvested our first sweet potatoes the other day, and ate a
> > > few. They were good in texture but very bland, as in lacking any
> > > sweet potato flavor. The variety was Vardaman, which was
> > > recommended.  I understand they like alkaline soil so they should
> > > be happy here. I'm wondering if it was something we did wrong or
> > > the variety. Any comments or recommendations? I'm thinking next
> > > year we will try a different kind.
> > >
> > > I may not have mentioned our regular potato harvest was a huge
> > > dissappointment. Two rows yeilded about five spuds the size of my
> > > thumb! Even with lots of compost I don't think we were able to
> > > overcome the high alkaline pH from the water. My husband says he
> > > can't live without potatoes, but I really don't want to waste any
> > > more time or room in the garden trying again. Has anyone overcome
> > > alkalinity and successfully grown potatoes? The only people I
> > > know in Texas with success are in the east Texas pine forest with
> > >  acidic soils and they are growing new, or red, potatoes.
> > >
> > > --Sage Way Out in Texas 
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--
“Fear is the path to the Dark Side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to
hate. Hate leads to suffering.”        Yoda