Potatoes bounce

Here a little over 2 weeks after potatoes were laid in this bed, the tops are already about 10 cm high. The combination of many days of sunshine and the warm weather while the bed has been covered with plastic, has given an optimal soil temperature and thus also a rapid growth. And that means it's time to dump the potatoes.

The hyping takes place by pulling soil up around the potato plant with the hoe. The operation serves several purposes: firstly, you get to weed the potato bed for some sprouted weeds, and secondly, more soil around the plant means that the new potatoes, which are planted at the soil surface, do not get sunlight and thus become green and inedible. Another benefit of hype is that mold spores do not easily penetrate the tubers when the potato mold hits (as it almost always does in July) - but here in bed it does not matter as the new potatoes should have been eaten long before.

This first hyping, of course, takes place with a more gentle hand than usual so as not to chop the radishes together with the weeds. The next time you jump, the radishes are hopefully eaten - otherwise you have to either jump by hand or cover in another way. Time will tell.

Written by Peter Norris, April 26, 2018