Harvesting Potatoes Grown in Hay (Ruth Stout Experiment)

It was time to have a peek under the hay and harvest all of the ruth stout potatoes due to blight setting in. Take a look to see how they did considering these were planted a month later than normal and also had no rain for about 2 months!

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HuwsNursery is a channel which dedicates itself to teaching you how to grow an abundance of food at your home. Videos are uploaded every week and cover a vast range of subjects including; soil health, sowing, transplanting, weeding, organic tips, permaculture, pest control, harvesting and low maintenance growing to name a few.

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[jamesprigioni]

I love that your bringing more recognition to Ruth Stout. Great video Huw!

[alaskansourdoughwormsgarde]

I grow potatoes in buckets here in Alaska. Something new that I tried on top to prevent green spuds was shredded cardboard since I don't have any straw. It appears to be working great. I use it for my vermicompost bins and used it as a second thought. When done I can put it in the compost pile.

[wmo]

Your honesty, curiosity and drive are inspiring! I look forward to my 'hugelculture/Ruth Stout' potato experiment this year!

[nunyabeeswax]

I harvest bigger potatoes when I cut up the potatoes before planting them, with at least one eye on each cut portion. Some people say to let the cut potatoes dry for a few days after cutting them up, before you plant them. At our local seed swap, there are big pans of cut up potatoes for others to take & plant.

[epicgardening]

Awesome to see this Huw! I was curious how the method would work ever since seeing her documentary...now the mystery is solved!

[PeroXepatonio]

potatoes all varieties need water especially after the first 20 - 30 days where they start showing leafage. I am watering them 2-3 times per week and will stop doing so and avoid any extra moisture in the last 20 days before harvest. I also started this ruth stout experiment this summer for the 1st time. Its been 18 since the 1st day and my potatoes started popping out from the straw. I am pretty excited.

[lorebrown]

Thanks for your courage. I know those moments of low expectations. Ruth Stout added cottonseed meal to bump up nitrogen. Back to Eden garden guy plants his potatoes when he harvests them. I overwintered purple potatoes in snowy N.Idaho and they did well in a raised bed, came on early. The straw breaks down and makes a lovely dark silky soil. Thanks for all your videos and showing what real gardening is like. Experimentation is fun, but always a roll of the dice!

[RajiTripathi]

As disheartening as it might be to get a lesser yield than you had expected, still it is encouraging to note that had the potatoes been planted earlier and if there been more rain then all those "tiny taters" of yours would have had a betobservation.
This is a valuable ovservation. I very much appreciate your sharing this because I am learning a lot, and as I get ready to plant potatoes in straw bales, compost, peat moss combo, I am better informed what pitfalls to avoid notwithstanding Mother Nature's whims, which are beyond anyone's control.
Our trouble is that we have had too much rain in the Mid-Atlantic region. The grounds were flooded and some of direct-sow seeds were washed away. This was the third such blow in the past 5 years.
Oh! Well ... we live an learn. Inspired by your clip, I can hardly wait to start this weekend and see what I get in 100-120 days down the road.

[helenp]

I do the same but with woodchip, I lay potatoes on top of the soil and cover them with about 4” of woodchip fresh or rotted it doesn’t matter and when I see them poking their leaves out the top I just put another inch or two of woodchip and leave them alone until harvest time, and then when I harvest them I put some back and leave them to grow and I have potatoes all year round 😃 minus a few that the mice eat!

[tuppybrill]

Something that strikes me is how clean they are coming out

[aknuthatch]

I'm 66 and plan on going full Ruth Stout method this year - I think I'd have left those spuds in the hay longer - You might have been able to double that yield - Thanks a ton for posting this - Great information - Very encouraging.

[harrybarnes]

5:10 these potatoes definitely could have benefited from another 2 to 3 weeks of growing. Many people wait for the tops of the potatoes to start dying back to harvest but either way this is an excellent video.

I learned a lot.

[curiousabouteverythinginli]

I love how u experiment to see what works best every crop u do is amazing thanks for the content as always huw

[jenmailsouth]

Love watching your videos. My family originated from your country and it makes me wonder what it was like living there. It looks a lot like where I live now in KY. Thanks for sharing your knowledge and experience.

[janetkrehbiel]

Thanks for sharing, and we are so happy you got rain there! Praise God for His goodness, we also got rain this week! We grew our potatoes differently this year also. We put down compost in rows, and planted the potatoes in that. We covered the plants with a frost blanket in April because we kept having late freezes, but the plants all survived. We mulched against greening, using grass clippings. We originally planted about 8 pounds of whole potatoes that we chitted before setting out. We harvested about 80 pounds. I planted them on March 17 and we harvested them in June, due to blight knocking them down. But they are the nicest red potatoes we've ever harvested, and we are very happy with the results. Thanks for your tips. We tried to use your grass clippings tips and Charles' no dig compost tips, and got good results! Blessings!

[stevejacobson]

Huw, Thanks so much for making the video. The potatoes may not be huge but there are alot of the small potatoes which can be so nice and tender. Love the Ruth Stout method.

[mikeross]

I look forward to your videos as they are excellent and full of good advice. I have just watched Charles Dowding’s video about growing no dig potatoes and you might consider next year trialling his method with the Ruth Stout method to see what does best in your situation.

[Marialla.]

12:12 You make the best point of all right here: it's about calories expended vs. calories harvested! It isn't about the productivity per square foot necessarily. But if you're slaving away digging, weeding, watering, fertilizing, getting sore and achey and using up (say) 5000 calories of energy to harvest (say) 2000 calories of potatoes, you've really lost on that bargain. But say if you spent a mere 50 calories just dropping potatoes onto the ground and scattering loose hay over them, then came back to harvest that same 2000 calories later, then that would be a really good bargain!
I know you split it somewhere down the middle, with pre-digging your bed, pulling weeds, and hauling manure before planting and mulching your crop. But the point is that you do not necessarily "get out what you put in". Sometimes you get out WAY more!

[Gandalf-The-Green]

I would say these look quite good considering the weather. I actually watered my potatoes all summer once a week with 5 liter per square meter, because of the severe drought here in Germany. And that sweet rain is coming to us tomorrow, or so they say. I would suggest to use that mulched space for a three sisters bed next year, with corn, beans and squash to really make a great soil and speed decomposition. Leeks and fava beans also leave a great soil.

[schomestead]

Always love your videos! Your editing is amazing. I can tell you've spent so much time finding & including the old video clips. On a side note, if you did a hay bed like that here in the SE USA you'd pull your hand out of it with a Copperhead or a Rattlesnake attached!