Leaf Bin Potatoes

[baymule]

Last fall, the 3 little boys accross the street were paid by my next door neighbor lady to rake her leaves. They were trying to earn money for Christmas. So I paid them $20 to bring me all the leaves! DH nearly busted a gut when he saw the Mountain Leaf Pile! I have a 90 gallon trash can on wheels and we filled it 5 times and dumped in the chicken run until it was 2 1/2' deep in leaves! The run now has a 4" layer of rich compost in it. But that still left a huge pile of leaves to deal with, DH was freaking out that the leaves were going to blow over his GRASS and ruin his lawn! (I would soooooooo dig up every last blade and replace it with garden beds) Oh, did I mention the leaf piles are in the front yard? Where they are an eyesore? I further conned him into helping me go shovel horse poop and mix with the leaves. I watered them all winter and planted potatoes in the 2 leaf/manure bins this spring. Another mad garden scientist experiment!!

This one is on the property line, so I put up chicken wire from the tree stump to the corner of the fence to keep it all nice and untidy! There is also a convienient 2' drop there which made a natural depression to hold the magic leaves!

This one is on the property line also, but is rather flat. It is out by the street where it can be admired by all who drive by.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Now that was a great idea! They look like they are doing wonderfully!

 

[Joel_BC]

An interesting experiment. Thanks for posting, and for including pictures.

Looks good so far. Please keep us posted through the season. I'm interested to learn how the spuds develop and turn out by harvest time.

On our place, most of the accessible leaves are either willow or maple. These are quite different from one another, but both of them tend to mat (if raked into piles). The willow leaves in piles will absorb water and become a soggy mass. The maple leaves will tend to repel water, and keep it from percolating into the soil below. We don't have a shredder, so I find it best to make piles while the leaves are dry and run over them with a mower. The resulting smaller pieces make piles that will break down into leaf mold in a reasonable time. Haven't tried growing potatoes in them, though.

 

[baymule]

I forgot to mention that I threw pecan shells in the mix too. You can see them in the bottom of the second picture. Joel, maybe you could mix your leaves with another compostable ingredient to make a good potato planting pile!

The best part will be when I harvest and see what is under all the leaves. I planted 3 pounds, cut into 50 eyes.

Waiting......... watching.......plants grow.......is like........watching.....paint dry, only s l o w e r.

 

[Joel_BC]

I forgot to mention that I threw pecan shells in the mix too. You can see them in the bottom of the second picture. Joel, maybe you could mix your leaves with another compostable ingredient to make a good potato planting pile!

Oh, yeah - and I forgot to mention that I've usually been adding the minced-up leaves from the piles I've mowed into our ordinary compost piles. But it would be good to experiment with the special qualities of leaf compost.

 

[~gd]

I forgot to mention that I threw pecan shells in the mix too. You can see them in the bottom of the second picture. Joel, maybe you could mix your leaves with another compostable ingredient to make a good potato planting pile!

Oh, yeah - and I forgot to mention that I've usually been adding the minced-up leaves from the piles I've mowed into our ordinary compost piles. But it would be good to experiment with the special qualities of leaf compost.

TreesHave the advantage of much deeper roots and can bring needed soluble minerals [including some you may not want to the surface} basically grass clipings and surface weeds return what ever is there.~gd

 

[hqueen13]

Sounds like dealing with the finger oaks where I grew up in NC, Joel. They just won't decompose!

Neat project! Can't wait to see how the potatoes turn out!

 

[Denim Deb]

Sounds like dealing with the finger oaks where I grew up in NC, Joel. They just won't decompose!

OK, I'm wondering if what you call finger oaks is what I call willow oak, or to be scientific, Quercus phellos. In fact, the way I remember the scientific name is by relating phellos to phalanges.

I had wanted to set something up last fall for potatoes, but didn't have the chance. So what I'm going to be doing is setting up a place in the garden and surrounding it by fence. Then, I'll put all the bark, sawdust, etc I have from doing the firewood in the bottom. Then, I'll take a bunch of the old hay from the goats in there. Once that stuff is all in, I'll put the potatoes in, then add straw, old leaves, etc to see how it does.

 

[dfr1973]

I will probably give this a go as well - not only do I have plenty of leaves that break down, but I have two 3lb bags of seed potatoes that are refusing to wait for fall. Using the lawnmower with its bag sounds like the easier way to get the leaves into the potato boxes.

 

[Denim Deb]

I'd like to figure out a way to grow sweet taters this way. But, I'm not sure it will work w/all the mulch.