Hilling Up Potatoes–Very Easy To Do!

May 25, 2010 at 5:54 pm (Potatoes, Vegetable gardening)
Tags: hilling potatoes

A quick post on how to hill up potatoes.  When the potato vines reach four inches or a bit more tall, it is time to start hilling.  Before I started, I took about 10 minutes to weed the ground between the rows, and I dug it up.  This will give the potatoes even more space in which to grow.

I like to use this two-in-one tool for weeding and hilling–it works great.

So the next step is to do the actual hilling.  You take your hoe, and drag some dirt up around the stems of the potato vines.  I just learned this from Steve Solomon’s book Gardening When It Counts, and this is where I was messing up before:  Never cover more than a quarter of the new growth.  So, if your vines are up four inches, you would only add one inch of soil around the stems.   Hill up on both side of the plant, so the vine is in the center of the hill.

Your finished hill will look something like this:

You will continue to hill your plants every 5 to 7 days.  Eventually, you will end up with hills that are 18 inches wide and about 10 inches tall.  You will continue to hill up until the vines get so big that they start to fall over, after which you can’t hill anymore.  All this hilling will also keep the area free of weeds.

I hope this helps you in your potato-growing ventures–I am expecting great things from them this year!