Potatoes and petrol

Warwick Rowell (warwick@bettong.eepo.com.au)
Sat, 14 Sep 1996 07:32:25 WST

We have a very productive potato patch with minimum labour.

Rock dust and worm castings were put in the hole in the straw
with each piece of seed potato. The straw came from unrolling
4 large circular bales; they came to about 20m long each
and we planted 3 seed spuds wide every 15".

Yesterday I gave them a foliar spray of fish emulsion. We
estimate ten hours input labour should yield over a tonne of
spuds. If they go well, 2 tonnes. Clean, ready to eat, just
rake the straw off, and pick them off the ground. We have
four varieties, this year.

Petrol here is 81.7 cents per litre - about $3/gallon. We never
jump in the car without seeing if there is another three things
we can do while we're "there". On the village, we'll have a
daily commute to the local town, and a twice a week service
to the major regional town, so people can also save on the
other costs of owning a second or third car, which are probably
as much or more again as the fuel costs.

Well said Bill.

Warwick

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 ______________________________________________________________
                 warwick.rowell@eepo.com.au                  
      Permaculture Applications Consulting & Education  
                Rosneath Farm, McLachlan Road
                  P.O. Box 250 Dunsborough 
                   Western Australia 6281 
                   097 568888  014 088385