http://www.durgan.org/URL/?AGRMZ Staking POTATOES
Quote To get the potato plants to grow longer, therefore harvesting more potatoes per square foot, try this. Get four bamboo stakes or anything that will double as bamboo stakes, and place them evenly around the potato plant. Then get some strong string and wrap it around the plants at just about the middle of the plant.
As the plants grow secure more string around the new growth (when you hill them is a good time). The staked potato plants will grow longer than un-staked plants because hormones are produced when the plants fall over as a signal to stop producing tubers. Staking the plants tricks them into growing longer and producing more potatoes per square foot. Unquote
What do you old farmers think of this article?
Staking POTATOES
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Martina
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Re: Staking POTATOES
I don't know about this technique as I haven't tried growing potatoes. But I bookmarked the site as it seemed really good and it's a garden related page for Toronto. You don't see many of them.
Thanks, Durgan.
Martina
Thanks, Durgan.
Martina
You can see my photos at------
http://www.flickr.com/photos/40007483@N05/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/40007483@N05/
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spitfire
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Re: Staking POTATOES
very interesting article, I bookmarked the site for my march crop. 
WHEN MY IRISH EYES ARE SMILING I'M USUALLY UP TO SOMETHING!!!
NEVER REGRET THAT WHICH ONCE MADE YOU SMILE.
NEVER REGRET THAT WHICH ONCE MADE YOU SMILE.
Re: Staking POTATOES
Staking is easy and simple to implement.
The author's surmise might have more validity, if some science backed up the statement, that when a potato plant falls over tuber growth is inhibited. It may be simply, that vegetation has less access to sunlight.
Closely studying the growth of a potato plant, it as been observed that there are probably larger and more new tubers if there is prolific vegetation. This is just an observation without any controlled experimentation.
I will experiment in 2010 to determines if there is any significant difference between staked and not-staked. Then it will be necessary to determine the cause. Meaning more vegetation being exposed, or something more esoteric like hormone generation from vegetation falling over shutting down further growth. The second part is probably impossible to verify in a home garden.
Excessive hilling also hides vegetation from exposure to sunlight. But the myth that new tubers grow along the stem of a potato plant has been propagated so often that it is almost universally accepted a being a fact
The author's surmise might have more validity, if some science backed up the statement, that when a potato plant falls over tuber growth is inhibited. It may be simply, that vegetation has less access to sunlight.
Closely studying the growth of a potato plant, it as been observed that there are probably larger and more new tubers if there is prolific vegetation. This is just an observation without any controlled experimentation.
I will experiment in 2010 to determines if there is any significant difference between staked and not-staked. Then it will be necessary to determine the cause. Meaning more vegetation being exposed, or something more esoteric like hormone generation from vegetation falling over shutting down further growth. The second part is probably impossible to verify in a home garden.
Excessive hilling also hides vegetation from exposure to sunlight. But the myth that new tubers grow along the stem of a potato plant has been propagated so often that it is almost universally accepted a being a fact