Growing potatoes in cardboard boxes

I mentioned in my previous post about planting potatoes in cardboard boxes. Well, I have decided to do a little experiment this year, comparing all the methods I use for potato growing.

In the past I have used car tyres for growing potatoes but became worried about the contents of car tyres leaching into the potatoes. Besides, cardboard boxes are a lot easier to get hold of than tyres and free tubs. The boxes only need to last a season and can then be composted after the harvest.

In a corner of the garden that is not much use for anything other than potato growing I have a few tubers already sprouting.

To use cardboard boxes for growing make sure you open both ends of the box so that there is drainage and room for roots to find their own way. You are merely using the box to hold earth up so that it doesn't spread around.

The box on the right I used as a surround for existing plants and the one on the left is for some new tubers. I placed two seed potatoes on the top soil and placed a shovel of earth on top of them. As they grow the box will be earthed up. The potatoes that don't have a cardboard surround will act as a control to compare yield. After harvesting the potatoes, the boxes will just be dug into the soil as worm food.

Over the years I have noticed that good earthing up affects yield. In deep beds earthing up material settles and moves away from the plant stem. In plastic tubs the earthing up material is constrained by the walls of the tub and the crop yield is higher.

In the garden

A few progress photos from the garden.

In the first photograph we can see a potato growing experiment. I call it No-Dig No-Container. To the left of the photograph you can see my standard method for growing potatoes in containers. I couldn't get any more tubs on Freecycle but I had a small plot into which I wished to squeeze a potato crop.

To the right of the tubs you can see the small plot with a cardboard surround propped up with bamboo sticks. I just put some seed potatoes on top of the soil, no digging down and placed a small mound of soil on top of the seed. As the plant grows you add more soil around its base. Even with rainfall the cardboard should last the season and will hold the earthing up material that I will dump in there. Without the makeshift walls the earthing up material would spread out and the crop wouldn't be as heavy.

I have built this experimental bed over some existing soil but you could do it over rough ground or grass. Just lay a bed of cardboard down, prop up the cardboard walls with stakes and then dump any organic matter into it and you have an instant deep bed. You could even plonk a cardboard box down, fill it with earth and start growing in it. The rain and slugs will break the cardboard down but it will still be holding soil at the end of the year.

In the second photograph we can see a more traditional potato crop in a deep bed. To the left is my onion crop. In the foreground are some pots with extra onions that will be used as spring onions. Also some pots of salad leaf, lollo rossa and small black pots with single heads of lettuce. I like growing in containers, it gives you more control. It also demonstrates that the excuse "I don't have a garden" is just that, an excuse.

Finally, my old fish boxes have shallots and beetroot this year. Behind you can just make out light blue and red boxes that I got on Freecycle. In them are growing gem lettuces and more beetroot. I have some more containers in which I will plant carrot seed in June. I read that carrot fly lay their eggs around here in May. Well, you have to try it, don't you?

Frankie Boyle on the Keiser Report

So good to see Frankie Boyle on the second half of the Keiser Report. If you think that my "rant" about the BBC was way off the mark then Frankie backs up some of what I say.

Many comedians like Frankie are no longer welcome on television because they discuss taboo subjects that the BBC does not want aired.

The BBC is a propaganda machine that Joseph Goebels would be proud of. Tame comedians using control words to keep the population stupid. "My grandmother is a racist and everyone born before 1980 should be persecuted" rather than "Hang the banksters!"

What would Bill Hicks have made of it all?

What I said to a friend...

in a recent email.

I recommend putting your savings into Rate Setter, Zopa and Funding Circle.

Whatever total amount you decide to invest, put one third each into the three above so as to spread the risk.

For you the 5 year lending option is best and recycle all payments back in.

If occasionally you want to pay yourself then stop the recycling and wait for the amount you want to build up in your holding account and then transfer to your normal bank.

You don't want to have any long-term savings in a bank any more. Interest rates will never go up. This is a deliberate attempt to take all money from wage slaves and to truly make them slaves; working but penniless.

What next?

Thursday was the first day of the year in which I ventured out of the house without having to wear a jumper, a coat and a pair of jogging pants under my trousers.

I went out to vote in the local elections and am glad to say that the person I voted for won the ward. So now my ward has its first UKIP councillor.

In the past I have disparaged the main political parties or LibLabCon-trick as I prefer to call them. Those three political parties act as though the Houses of Parliament are private members clubs and outsiders are not welcome. Well, a shot across their bows!

Across Europe the people are getting fed up with the "ruling élite" with its wasteful two parliaments and three unelected presidents. A wasteful bureaucracy that does nothing for the common people.  

Growing

In the garden I have been busy with planting potatoes in a new style that I am going to try as an experiment. I call it No-Dig No-Container potato growing. The seed potatoes are simply left on the surface of the earth and a little mound of compost put on top of them.

As the potatoes grow I will earth up. But, to stop the earthed-up material settling down and away from the potato plants, I shall be building a wall of cardboard, around the plants, propped up with stakes.

This cardboard wall will last a season and be akin to container growing. When the potatoes are harvested the cardboard will left as mulch and rot away.  

Money

I no longer have any bank accounts due mostly to the woeful interest rate but also due to mistrust of the banking system. As you know I have a gold/silver bullion holding, which has taken a hit by market manipulators recently but the market will snap back to bite the bankster fraudsters. My bullion is staying put!

My cash is now entirely in peer2peer lending, a form of lending money direct to members of the public without recourse to the banking system. People with excess money are not getting enough interest from banks to overcome inflation. Likewise, borrowers are being fleeced by the banksters to get money to survive on.

Peer2peer lending brings together lenders and borrowers. Hosting websites such as Zopa and Rate Setter do all the credit checks and take 1% commission. With interest on a 3 year loan at over 4% and over 5% on a 5 year loan, more and more people are moving their money out of banks and into peer2peer lending.

Oxford

Interesting but no big deal. I went there merely to prove that I was good as anyone else. I got into the quiz team, gave Oxford Brookes a 540 - 0 point hammering. I shan't be submitting a thesis.

Downsizing

Finally, after 6 years of selling on eBay, I see the light at the end of the tunnel. The attic is almost empty, my DVD and CD collection gone, my books depleted from several thousand to less than a hundred.

My intention is to have no more than a few clothes, my car, computer (with all the ripped DVDs and CDs on it), tools and kitchen utensils. I want to possess no more than a small van load of items and less than that, if possible. I have no emotional attachment to anything, any more.

My childhood has been completely sold off. Everything must be liquidated and converted into cash for peer2peer lending or bullion.

Since leaving Ireland in 2007 I have kept my eye on the housing market and watched prices crash. I am now tempted to go back and buy a place.

Taking each day as it comes.