#Potato

#potato #potatoes #plantingpotatoes #potatoplanting #selfsufficent #growyourown

Planting potatoes: I show here the easiest and most natural and environmental way of growing potatoes. These methods have been followed for hundreds of years, particularly in Ireland.

This a perfect time to become self sufficient by growing your own potatoes and other vegetables.
At the end of February, I started digging the first ridge of the season to plant my potatoes in the traditional Irish way (often referred to as the 'lazy-bed' method. I aim to bury that dubious title!).There is no better, more environmentally-friendly and efficient way to grow potatoes than to follow the old traditional methods as practiced by our ancestors for hundreds of years (stick with me - I will prove it). See    • Traditional Irish Potato Planting in Beara  
Ridge-making and tools differ throughout the country but essentially they achieve the same results.
All you need is a spade (or in some parts of the West and North Midlands, a loy) a bit of lawn and maybe a lesson or two ...
I learned potato farming in the large and fertile fields of South Tipperary (the Golden Vale) in the 1950s and '60s. In the '70s, using every mechanical trick in the book - and advice from my father and old neighbours - I grew very profitable crops of potatoes (Then I opened a bookshop - but sin scéal eile!).
Moving to the Beara Peninsula, 25 years ago I learned a different way, a very sustainable way, that has survived for over 200 years. See - Traditional Irish Potato Planting in Beara (in my channel - the long one, 37 min) which I made with my neighbour, Michael 'Murt' O'Sullivan.    • Traditional Irish Potato Planting in Beara  
Michael is a survivor of an extraordinary generation that kept alive the lore, craft - and indeed physical grace - of growing potatoes in the 19th C and before.
Ni bheidh a leithéid arís ann (See more details of Michael in the Description before that video).
Here in the current Feb 2021 film, I follow my own way, which, whilst not as skilled or graceful as Michael's, is reasonably proficient and I do end up with a large and very fertile ridge or raised bed. But, over a series of videos, I will keep learning, going back to Micheal's unique, authentic ways, and continue to explore regional variations and other potato lore.
It will be my privilege to pass it on to you.

Irish ridge-making was arguably the most efficient type of potato cultivation ever practiced in north-western Europe - or indeed further afield. Before the Great Irish Famine of 1845 '49, incredibly, 2.5 million acres of potatoes (there were millions more of wheat, oats, rye etc) were cultivated with this method. It was a superb example of a horticultural practice ideally suited to the climate and geology - and man and woman-power - of Ireland. Yields of potatoes per acre using spades and ridges produced crops that have never been surpassed, even to this day. And up to the coming of the blight fungus in 1845 we were the best-fed peasantry in the world (again, stay with me - I can prove that too). Uniquely, the Irish population grew by 400 per cent in the 100 years between the census of 1741 and that of 1841. What cannon-fodder we were for the Empire ...!
There is here a huge and timely lesson for us all today: Listen to the wise and experienced (like Michael) and learn how to cultivate and grow in the most efficient and environmentally-friendly way. Then, all else will follow; that the least amount of ground is used to produce sufficient (you can simultaneously plant onions, shallots and turnips on the edges and peas and beans among the potatoes) and healthy organic food - with the least physical effort - to keep a family throughout the year.

Tip for main-crop: Buy potatoes off the shelves in the spring, cut the sprouting ends off the biggest of them, cauterise them with wood ash and store them exposed to the light. The sprouts will get green and strong (called 'chitting') and give you weeks of a start on the growing season (thus evading the blight season from July).

Questions on yields, efficiency: I think in acres and yards and in llbs, cwts and tons. Back in the 1970s I used to get over 25 tons to the acre of HDM potatoes per acre. The sowing rate was one ton to the acre.
Some questions were in metric measurements of per 500 sqm.
500 sqm, one twentieth of a hectare, is just one eighth of an acre. Therefore the sowing rate was two and a half cwts or 280 llbs =127 kgs. I would expect to get more weight per sq yard from my 2021 ridges - all with natural eco-methods. But the feeding quality of potatoes grown my way is far, far superior to conventional methods. Efficiency? Through the roof! Taste? Heavenly!