Tomato Bed and Potato Bugs

The mortgage lifter tomato plants are very happy in the raised bed and growing nicely. But what are these insects on the potato leaves? Yuck. Ewwww.

Combo Bin - Potato, Sunflower, Cantaloupe

Only half of this potato bin seemed to sprout, so I got crazy and and planted sunflowers AND cantaloupe in the 2 foot by 2 foot section. This is a foliage explosion waiting to happen. Stay tuned and see what happens to this in another 2 months. Wow. Can you say overgrown?

Potato Bin Progress

Well the potato bin is really going bananas. Got the 3rd level in today. I keep adding soil mix and cover all but the tops of the plants. It would be so great if I could get 100 potatoes out of this bin, but time will tell how it turns out. For now, it sure is fun.

Potatoes Ranch

Some of the potatoes in containers are starting to bloom. The raised bed potatoes have grown to the second level now. We added a 2 x 8 row, and filled with more soil mix. The 2 other raised beds have tomato plants, although 1 of the tomato plants was eaten by someone so only have 3 tomato plants left in this area.

Potato Growth - Tomato Beds

Well the one potato bed is growing fast and furious, but the other potato bed barely has 4 plants out of 20 that came up. Not sure why, and now I forget which bed was gold and which bed was russets. I think the bed on the left is russets but not for sure. The 2 new beds that went in today are for tomatoes. Will plant 2 per bed and then use 2x2 lumber to build a cage around the plants for support. More to come on that as they grow. Happy Gardening!!!

Raised Bed Broccoli - 4" of Rain

Here is the raised bed with 8 broccoli plants and 1 cabbage plant in the center. Dad has the challenge of growing the largest cabbage for an elementary school contest. No pressure, right? The potatoes in containers are lined up next to the raised beds. Last night 4 inches of rain, omg, lol, that's a lot of rain.

We're Back - New Farm - New Potatoes

Well we have been away from the blog for a long time. Traded in our suburban existence for country living. We're starting over with new gardens, and because of the clay soil, we are using raised beds for now. Here is the new potato ranch.

Potato Ranch Update - 29 Plants

Here's the latest with the potato ranch. We have 3 rows. In front are the youngest plants. In the back are the oldest, and hopefully soonest to harvest. In the middle are the halfway grown plants. After taking the photo, we were motivated and planted 2 more containers of spuds. Happy Gardening!!! Stay Cool.

Onions Out, Potatoes Blooming, Ahhhh

Back at Our Suburban Garden it is onion picking day. The onions completely wilted so we thought we would clear the area. Wah Bam, now we have onions a plenty. For now anyway. In the background are our flowering potatoes. In all our months of potato gardening, these are the first flowers we have gotten. These days of plentiful fresh home grown veggies are so rewarding. Have a happy gardening day.

Potato Ranch Round 2

We have been pretty busy with the potato ranch for the past couple of months. We try to plant 1 potato every 3 days. The idea is to have the harvest to stretch out over a longer period of time. If we can harvest 1 container each week it would be awesome. There's another 40 seed potatoes so we'll run out of containers before long I hope.

Suburban Container Garden

The double decker green bean patch at the end is flanked by the bush cucumbers and the potato ranch is beginning to take shape again. We got the containers hooked up to the drip sprinkler system. Originally we put the sprinkler pipes in for flowers, but guess what? No flowers, just veggies. Pretty soon we'll plant more and expand the garden. Gardening is good!!!

Potato Ranch Update

The tater ranch is in a state of renewal. It's soon going to be out with phase 1 and in with the new spuds. So far we have 5 containers started for phase 2 and looking forward to starting more soon. Our harvest now stands at 76 potatoes. And each and every one was yummy. If anyone has ideas on starting potatoes fast, please let me know. We've got 10 potatoes sitting out on the counter just waiting for their eyes to sprout. Wish they would sprout faster..... Happy Gardening from Our Suburban Garden to Yours.

20 Yukon Gold Potatoes

While we're on this potato harvesting kick, here are the first Yukon gold potatoes grown in Our Suburban Garden. Seems like all the potato plants are dying off for the harvest even though we stretched the planting out over a 4 month period. Perhaps the Yukon golds have a longer growing season and the Reds have a shorter season so they all meet in the middle. The Dark red norlands made excellent mashed potatoes and home fries. We are looking forward to enjoying these new spuds soon.

18 Potatoes

Yesterday and today we emptied out a potato container plant each day. The containers had 9 taters each. That brings our total to 44 potatoes. Home fries were a wonderful treat yesterday with salt, pepper, and chicken tikka masala sauce. Planning for some nice smooth mashed potatoes on Friday from these babies.. Happy Gardening!!!

Lil Bro Demonstrates Potato Harvest

Even a kid can do it. He harvested 4 taters today! Just click the play button to watch how he did it. Happy Gardening from Our Suburban Garden.

Potato Ranch Update

Here is the latest on the potato container ranch. The ones in the middle seem to be dying off and will be the next harvested once they loose all their green foliage. The remainder of them are doing pretty well. One of these days we will get around to planting the next set. The last time we planted potatoes was March 1st. Happy gardening from Our Suburban Garden to yours.

4 Potatoes Today

Since the potatoes grow underground it is a mystery what we will get until the end. We thought that the plants were suffering from too much water when a few of the container plants wilted and died. So today we took the most dried up plant and dumped him out. What a joy to find some beautiful, we might say perfect potatoes. We knew that you harvest them after they dry out, but the containers were mixed up and we don't know which was which. Great surprise for our Thursday afternoon. Yay for a Suburban Garden success!!

The Potato Ranch Update

Very nice progress at the potato ranch as you can see. We are planting one row of containers per month. Hoping the harvest will stretch out over several months also. Everyone can do this.

10 Potato Containers

Here is the entire potato ranch so far. I add a new row each month. As the plants grow, I add layers of compost and potting soil until we reach the top of the pot. We have about 10 more seed potatoes to go, so by late spring we will have quite a potato patch. You should try this. It's easy and rewarding.

First Potato Pic

We are growing potatoes in containers. This is a russet. The kids also planted dark red norlands and yukon golds. So far we planted 2 in Dec., 4 in Jan. and 4 in Feb. Lots of freedom fries, home fries, and mashed (kids' fave) someday.