We’ll eat potatoes in just about any shape or form. My family isn’t picky, we like them baked, cut up in fries, mashed, and just about any other way you could have a potato. We use potatoes in at least one meal a week, so it was a no-brainer that I start growing them as soon as possible. I’ve been growing them for years, and my kids enjoy picking them just as much as they enjoy eating them. Though you can grow them easily in a regular garden bed, I prefer to plant my potatoes in porch-side planters.
Here’s what you’ll need to create your own DIY potato planter:
-2-gallon-sized buckets..I used this kind.
-A jigsaw
-A sautering iron (or something else that can be used to drill holes in the bottom)
-soil
-3 sprouted potatoes (learn how to sprout potatoes here)
Step One: Break out your sautering iron, or similar tool, and use it to create damage holes on the bottom of both buckets. It’s important that you drill holes in both because it will provide the plants with the necessary amount of drainage.
Step Two: Whichever container you would like to be the outside, set it aside. This will remain as-is until later on in the DIY potato planter project.
Step Three: You will want to use a jigsaw for this next step: cut out three large squares around the sides of the bucket. Each cut-out window should be about 5cm wide and a perfect square. I recommend sketching the cut outs with a whiteboard marker before making them permanent with the jig-saw!
**You don’t have to use a jig-saw to make the cuts, but it’s just what I thought was the easiest to use!
Step Four: Place the bucket with the cutouts into the other bucket. See, aren’t things coming together? Fill the bottom with a good layer of soil, filling the buckets up by about halfway, and place a potato in front of every cutout. Once potatoes are placed, fill the rest of the bucket with soil. Make sure that the soil is packed well, keeping the potatoes unexposed from sunlight. Water well once the soil is ready, but water sparingly after that. Soil should never be kept moist.
Step Five: When it’s ready to harvest (you’ll know because the plant begins to bloom), simply remove one bucket from inside the other, and pick the plants that you want. You’ll probably notice that you have quite a few now! When done, place the buckets back inside of one another and repack the soil on the top of the plant.
Now, go enjoy your potatoes with some of these tasty recipes from Cut Side Down!
Leave a Reply