Week 15 - Potato Tower Harvest

For episode/article 15 for This Week in the Garden, we’re finally harvesting the potato towers. This is the second straight week of first time experiences in the garden and in this episode we’ll go over my experience with potato towers, we’ll see how they turned out, and what I could have done better.

Before we talk about the harvest I’ll explain the potato towers in case you missed Week 5’s video/article. The goal of potato towers is to grow potatoes vertically in a way that’s easy to harvest. Because potatoes grow underground and must be dug up to be harvested, there’s the potential to damage the spuds. Potato towers alleviate this problem because the plants are placed into a cage tower that has a dirt center surrounded by straw. The seed potatoes are placed on the edge of the dirt-straw boundary. The potatoes grow from the roots and into the soil, while the stems and leaves grow out of the cage. It’s an odd method, but is exciting to watch your potatoes emerge from the towers; I highly recommend everyone try a potato tower.

In the Week 5 video/article I mentioned some of the set-backs I had from planting too late, to planting in hay that was denser than the straw and has been a hindrance to the stem emerging. I was a little concerned these issues would reduce or even prevent the formation of potatoes, but after the other vegetable rows were in I was done planting and decided to see if anything would grow.

This week, sort-of live on the video, we harvested the potatoes not knowing what to expect. I decided to harvest the potatoes at this time because the foliage had died off and I let them sit for about two weeks. I did this to allow the skins to thicken, which should help the potatoes last a little longer. Unfortunately, the video stopped prematurely and it didn’t capture the whole harvest. In total, I dug up about 40-50 yellow potatoes from the 15 that I planted. I harvested about twice that many from the red potato towers, but I planted twice as many. From this year, it didn’t seem like either type grew better than the other. All of the potatoes were slightly smaller than I would have liked, however, that wasn’t unexpected because I planted them late.

After the harvest, I will wipe the dirt off the potatoes and discard any that have damage. I had a few that grew near the wire and were malformed; I plan on cutting those up and eating them within a week. The rest of the potatoes will be moved inside and stored in the pantry or under the fridge, somewhere that’s dark and cool.

All in all, I highly recommend anyone who has an interest in gardening to try a potato tower. The set-up was relatively easy and didn’t take a lot of money or time. The care for potatoes was simple as well; I watered the potatoes thoroughly at planting and added fertilizer once during the year, that was it. The best part was the harvest. Not knowing if the potatoes grew or what sizes/shapes they were was like opening a present on your birthday. And after all the work, you get delicious potatoes!

I hope this episode encourages you to experiment in your garden and gets you curious about potatoes and alternative gardening techniques. If you’ve got any questions or comments, send me an email or fill out our form. That’s all for this article from This Week in the Garden, stay tuned until next time.

-Adam