Black plastic and potatoes

[Florence Fennel]

Thanks Alison, that's a real help.

[Florence Fennel]

Have you thought about mixing in or watering in some Mycorrhizal fungi? These are really good at boosting plant and root growth.

I may have to Google that Lotsaveg, it's not something I've heard of. I was intending to go down the chicken poo pellet route as suggested, but I will have a look.

[Lotsaveg]

Mycorrhizal fungi apparently link to the plants roots and increase uptake of water, nutrients etc... so stronger and more healthy plants are produced with greater yield for less effort. I'm going to try it on all my veg this year. I see that Harrod Horticultural are selling it as plant strengtheners.

[zazen999]

Before you do, can I refer you to this:

http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...ing_55426.html

[Alison]

So long as you make sure your spuds are in decent fertile soil then they'll do fine without anything fancy added.

[Lotsaveg]

I agree there's a huge amount of rubbish out there to tempt folk to part with their cash. The one that amazed me was a spray product that sold for £5 which I found out consisted of 1.5ml detergent and 498.5ml water!!

My policy is to only use what's proven in the commercial world... read the commercial growing news and try it out at home if the products can be acquired. The Mycorrhizal fungi are having really good reviews.

[oldie]

I used Mycorrhizal fungi when I planted out my native hedging bushes as it was provided with them and recommended. Using it on potatoes would (imo) be a rather expensive "treat".

[Lotsaveg]

Just checked price... about £8 for 20 sq. m on here: Please enable your cookies

I've got my earlies in at 16 seeds per sq. m so that'll work out about 2.5p per plant... I'll be giving it a go and let you know how I get on.

[oldie]

There is another magazine and in this months issue they describe a test growing potatoes under heavy a) duty plastic b)permeable ground cover and c)straw. Straw came out top.

[Stu_R]

There is another magazine and in this months issue they describe a test growing potatoes under heavy a) duty plastic b)permeable ground cover and c)straw. Straw came out top.

I'm hoping to try out the straw way once Im all sorted.

[King Carrot]

I agree there's a huge amount of rubbish out there to tempt folk to part with their cash. The one that amazed me was a spray product that sold for £5 which I found out consisted of 1.5ml detergent and 498.5ml water!!

My policy is to only use what's proven in the commercial world... read the commercial growing news and try it out at home if the products can be acquired. The Mycorrhizal fungi are having really good reviews.

I'd give it a good review too if I was given a nice jolly or two, not saying this is the case here but that kind of thing does happen far too frequently in this world

Don't know if you're planning to do this but it would be interesting to have an area with it applied and an area without it and see the difference it makes to your crops. For example plant half a variety of spud in the treated area and the other half in the untreated area, same with seeds and transplants- be interesting to see the results, lot of hassle though

[Lotsaveg]

Yes, I'll definitely have an untreated area to compare with. I'll let you know what happens when I start digging them up for those lovely summer salads.... I'm dribbling at the thought!

[King Carrot]

Yes, I'll definitely have an untreated area to compare with. I'll let you know what happens when I start digging them up for those lovely summer salads.... I'm dribbling at the thought!

Good luck with it - it'll be interesting to even see if there's a difference in the rate of growth and amount of haulm cover before harvesting, photos would be good if poss