In an effort to learn more about the potato bins, I opted to make a new thread so each of us here can tell us what the circumstances around your potato bins were. Everyone seems to use a different material and has a different way of filling the bins - and different varieties. My goal is here is to get a 'best practice' and what works best for this scenario so we can all learn from it. The fact of making so many potatoes in a small area is perfect for those that have limited space.

So, maybe the following:

- Type/varieties of potatoes used
- Type of materials your potato bin is made from
- How high is your potato bin and how high you filled it
- Type of mixture you used to fill in your bin as they grew
- When you added additional fillings of soil/compost/mixture
- Amount of potatoes received from your bin
- Other comments

I'll start with mine here:

- I used the Kennebec variety of potatoes. I planted five seed potato starts with one eye in each.
- My bin is made of 1 x 6 arsenic-free treated boards
- My bin is 2 x 3 feet and 2.5 feet tall. I filled it all the way to the top as the potatoes grew. At the end of the season, the mixture settled about 5 inches below the 2.5 foot line.
- I used an enriched soil mix as the base - about 80% horse manure, 20% compost. As the container grew, I used mostly leaf compost to fill in.
- I added additional fillings to the box as they grew. I only left a few leaves above the surface but completely covered the rest of them.
- I received about 2.5 pounds of potatoes. Only one of the five survived.

Other comments:

All but one of the five starts sprouted. They were planted about four - five inches under the surface (which was about one foot deep - so they were planted about 7 to 8 inches from the bottom).

While filling the bin, I believe I was too extreme on covering the plants. In early June, only one of the potatoes survived and the other three died off.

Interesting that you only got potatoes in the first six inches on all of them from what I read.

From what I have seen on jbest123's blog, he also only had potatoes in the first couple inches of the top and none at the bottom as well.

I'm still going to give it ago again next year with the bin I made that is 2.5 feet tall - but I'm beginning to see that the bin idea doesn't exactly work from all of the real information I've seen. Sinfonian also had this problem last year - and I haven't seen any results from this year for him yet.

I guess I do have a good 12 or so five-gallon buckets - maybe I'll just fill all of those up and try to put potatoes in those this coming year as well.

Nothing beats the home-grown potatoes that I tasted out of the garden this year - so I want to try to get my hands on as many as possible - although I am extremely limited in the space I have (unless I make an eye-sore and make more beds in the front yard!).

I am also curious to see how others have fared with this. I've ordered Bintje, Banana, and Purple Viking potatoes to try this method next year... although I will probably build my "tower" with heavy, folded cardboard or some such free material.

bsntech,

Vegetable beds don't have to be an eyesore! Just plant things like peppers, runner beans, and greens in your front yard, and it can be really pretty! Just maybe save the potato bins for the back =)

Lori