Ides of March? Eyes of March you mean

It is officially potato planting time here on the homestead.

The lazy bed method is my favorite way of planting potatoes. I have been doing this method for years, and it is surprising that I do not have any photos of the technique. I will do a step by step pictorial for you later if you like. 

I digress, we started doing the Lazy bed method because of the clay soil we have and the flooding that happens here on the homestead. And we discovered last year, that it helps during droughts as well. 

It's simple, create an elevated row, double wide, place your potato seeds on top of the dirt, do not cover with soil, then cover the bed in a foot of straw. If you straw begins to grow later in the season, carefully flip it, or leave it be as it will never get tall enough to hurt your potatoes. 

A tip here; plant your watermelon in the middle of the double rows. These two plants benefit from one another, and help you condense your garden.

If you are dead set on planting your potatoes the traditional way, in ground:

plant large edible sunflowers with them if you have hard clay like soil. The thick rooting system of the sunflowers allow the tubers to find their way around and easier on them to grow larger. It's like how earth worms use dandelion root systems to move around. Plus the sunflowers helps with clay type soils. It does take a few years, but worth it.

Different potatoes need different things. Seems to me like all potatoes need the same things. However we have found that some types of potatoes do better than others in our soil type. Sweet potatoes love it (if you are wanting to plant sweet potatoes, I have a small how to here>>>)

Yukon's seem to grow wonderfully with the lazy bed method. Russet types do better in ground with sunflowers. My reds, I have still been experimenting with as they tend to struggle with both these techniques. I really wanted to link over to some one, however I forgot which one of you wrote about it. If you have an article link to it in comments please. We are going to try the potato in the tire method for the reds, to see if mulch and compost will generate better results. Blues or just about any fingerlings seem to be more impressive if potted.

Any questions?

On a personal note. Husband and I have decided to back out of the motorcycle shop. It's a private story. However you have me back full time. Please ask questions or demand a how-to so that I can get back into the swing of things. Thank you.