It's time to plant the potatoes! And some other stuff.

Red Potatoes from the Estate

The soil at the Estate is not great. The property and the land around it used to be owned by a sand company. Much of the surrounding land is still owned by them. So, what we have a lot of is sand. Think sand dune sand. It's very fine and blows around easily. In the woods, there is a decent amount of organic matter on top, but only a few inches under that is sand. The good news is, we don't have to worry about flooding. Even after a hard rain, the ground is dry within a very short time. The bad news is, the ground doesn't hold water very well either. In the summer, the sand gets so hot that it burns anything that tries to grow. In places where there is established grass or weeds, it's not as bad, but it still struggles.

Of course, I want to grow things here. In the food plot area, it's one of the few open places that has decent soil. It's not great, but it's not terrible. I've been able to grow clover and Sorghum pretty well. I planted corn and soybeans last year for the deer, but they didn't grow. That was mostly because I broadcast seeded them and I am sure the critters came out and ate most of my seed. Any they didn't get likely were burned by the sun. Now that I have a corn planter, this should be less of an issue, I hope.

One thing I have been able to grow is potatoes. They will grow in just about any soil, which is good for me. Last year I planted a bunch but the deer liked the tops so much that they kept them from producing any potatoes. The prior year, the deer left them alone completely and I had a ton of spuds. My plan for this year is to put up a temporary fence around the potatoes to keep the deer activity to a minimum. I don't mind if they nibble on them, it actually stimulates the plants to keep growing, but I don't want them to eat them to the ground.

I will have at least 2 different potato beds at different locations on the property as well. I am hoping that by spreading them out, they will get less pressure. We will see. I may even do more than 2 beds depending on how I'm feeling at the time.

Row of seed potatoes ready to be buried

So far, I've planted Yukon Gold and Red Norland potatoes. I am also going to plant some Russet and maybe some Kennebec to add some variety. I am a big fan of potatoes and grew up with a father who was a meat and potatoes kind of guy. He always had a huge garden and a large potato planting. We had potatoes coming out of our ears. One time, we even had them growing out of the crawlspace under our house. That's where we stored them after digging them up. Dad had a big crate we put them in just inside the small access door. Apparently, some had fallen out of the crate and we didn't notice until they started to grow. They had grown so much that they were growing out of the cracks in the door. When we opened the door to see what was going on, it was shocking to see how long the vines were and how much they had grown. It was like something out of the movie Jumanji (the original). They had rooted themselves in the dirt floor of our crawl space and the tops were reaching for the slivers of light coming through the cracks in the access door. Just a testament as to how resilient potatoes are. Since we are on sand, there is little resistance to the roots growing and they tend to do really well.

As far as "other stuff", we are going to plant some pumpkins this year as well as some onions and maybe some sweet corn.

Fingers crossed that I can keep the deer at bay this summer and that my potato crop is one that would make my father proud.