Mr. Potato Stack!

I have been wanting to do this for ages and finally ordered my seed potatoes in from Green Harvest and they arrived the other day. I ordered some good old Desiree and Toolangi Delights (the purple skinned kind). I have actually eaten potatos that are purple on the inside as well which were delicious many years ago and would love to get my hands on them but lets just have a go at one lot first. I did get two of the potato bags also, and I will get them going also. I will start each crop at least 3 weeks apart to try and prolong my harvest time, but I was really keen to get the spud tower going.

Seed potatoes with shoots up...  Black dog supervising.

I was intrigued at this way of growing potatoes ever since one of my fellow participants in my PDC told me about doing it with tyres though I am still not sure about growing food in tyres due to leaching. But I spent up big on seeds and books the other day and found this lovely book - The Little Veggie Patch Co. and they had a 'recipe' for a potato stack so I thought I would give this one a go. I formed some chicken wire into a circular enclosure which is about 50cm in diameter. Places a heap of straw at the bottom and up the sides (10cm roughly each way) and filled the centre with compost (another 10cm) placed my seed potatoes on top and then another rim of straw around the sides and filled the centre (on top of the spuds) with compost again. Then I put the straw over the top of the compost to stop it drying out. Fingers crossed.

Hay packed up around the sides - ready for next layer of compost.

The lupins were getting ready to go to seed so it was time to pull them out and lay them down to provide a layer rich in nitrogen for the tomato beds. So they were all pulled out and the no-dig goes on top.

The lupins lay down fo rthe tomatoes.

Also really excited to have ordered some calendular pot marigolds after watching a great story on Gardening Australia about making your own skin ointments. Some various types of sunflowers so I can decorate the hall for an upcoming function in November and some great books on growing food in small spaces. Purchased sweet corn seedlings from the markets as well as eggplant, a capsicum plant and some red sorrell. But they will have to be sorted in the next couple of days.