Growing potatoes under hay

Since we have 2 out of 3 new created garden beds, in our garden 1, left and we have a big crate of sprouting potatoes in our barn, we might as well combine both.

Since this soil is very hard and we only loosened a top layer, we decided to plant the potatoes under mulch instead of trenching them. (Link to making this garden bed) This means, laying out the potatoes on top of the soil and covering them with a mulch. In our case we used a complete round bale of biomass.

Since our potatoes where already sprouted with very long sprouts, I was worried that the sprouts would brake when we would lay them out first and cover them afterwards. Therefore we divided the biomass first and then planted the potatoes into the biomass. This was very exhausting and not something I would want to do this way again.

We used only the long garden bed (about 23 meters long) out of the 2, since I have something else planned with the other one. We planted 3 rows of potatoes about 60 cm apart and laid the potatoes about 30 cm apart in the row.

Since we had a good amount of rain this spring I thought we would not have to water before mulching, but while planting the potatoes I started wondering if the moisture in the soil would be enough. With a normal rain shower the water will not penetrate the mulch layer, so the change of extra moisture going underneath the mulch is very small. Just to be sure I did water the garden bed after everything was done. My husband parked our water trailer beside the garden bed and I laid out the garden hose and let the water run (on gravity) for about 10 minutes at the time on different spots along the garden bed. This way the water gets underneath the mulch and can spread and soak in properly. Normally you would give the garden bed a good soak before you put on the mulch layer.

We planted the potatoes end of May, but there is still no growth to be seen after two and a half weeks. I only had to replant a couple of potatoes in the mean time. Something has dough them up.

Now all that’s left to do is wait until the potatoes pop up and hope for the best, a good harvest I mean of course.