After almost three months of non-stop rain, it finally dried up enough for me to plant my taters. We already have had our yearly average rainfall total and it is only the end of March. At least all the moisture made it easy to dig the trenches with a real old style tool.
That hoe is usually reserved for mixing concrete, but it will move some earth as well. I planted four varieties of taters.
Yukon Gold (Six Pounds)
Red Norland (Five pounds)
Gold Rush (A New Variety for me. One Pound)
Russet (One Pound)
That made two and a half rows. The delay in planting meant that all the taters had sprouted well, which made it easy to use the classic American method of cutting in half any tuber that had more than four eyes on it, and every Red Norland did. Every cut tater was dipped in agricultural lime.
After I aligned my trenches with my homemade garden string combo, I lined each one with crushed egg shells for calcium, and pelletized lime for more calcium and magnesium. The final touch will be to top dress them all with some composted chicken manure. That will be my only source for nitrogen, until they leaf out, and then they get some liquid Alaska fish fertilizer.
Hopefully, the taters will no longer smell of rotten fish when I dig them.
Southern Fusion Cooking 