After a few days of settling, the towers are ready to plant. The decision was to plant six spots in each tower. If the seed potatoes were small, two were planted together – otherwise just one.
The potatoes were covered with a compost, peat soil mixture about 4” deep.
Lastly, each was topped with a layer of straw to prevent the light soil mix from blowing out and to retain moisture while the potatoes sprouted.
As the potatoes grow through the early half of the season, additional sideboards will be added along with more soil mix to hopefully increase production in the towers.
The varieties planted were Adirondack Blue, Mountain Rose, Harvest Moon, Adirondack Red, Pinto Gold, Purple Sun, Red Norland, and Yukon Gold. Once a field site is prepared, field rows will also be planted for comparison.