Review by Michael Smith (Veshengro)
Potato Grow Pot
Manufactured by Alagra Products
Made in Britain
Lakeland Ref 51841
Not available in Lakeland stores, mail order only.
Price: £19.99
With a space-saving design so even the tiniest gardens, a patio or even balcony, can reap rewards. Just plant your tubers in the base pot and, as they grow, you can stack a second then third ‘collar’ and add more compost to increase the pot’s yield.
Providing the ideal growing conditions for a maximum crop of potatoes, the air circulates freely into the compost and, because each collar also has an external trough, watering and feeding each level can be accurate and precise. Made from what is said to be “durable” plastic.
The good thing is that you don't have to – and ideally shouldn't – leave the pots outside during the harshest parts of winter; some plastics certainly do not like too much on the frost front. When you have harvested your spuds you carefully dismantle the pot into its parts, clean everything and then store it all safely in your shed or garage, or wherever safe.
The Potato Grow Pot comes with full instructions and a PDF of them is also available to download from the website at www.alagraproducts.co.uk.
Each ‘collar’ has a diameter of 43cm, that is17 inches in old money, and is 23cm, that is to say 9 inches, tall. The total height is 61cm (24 inches) and the overall capacity 60 litres.
I have used a number of different types of containers in which to grow spuds – and other vegetables for that matter – and all require digging for the taters. The Potato Grow Pot does away with that in that, come harvest time, you simply take it down section by section and collect the potatoes from the soil. Simple.
Although maybe just a little early seeing it is just the first week of March I have started my first lot of potatoes now in the Potato Grow Pot and we shall see how things progress. If the grow or not will have little to do with the pot but everything to do with the elements, pests and diseases and my care of them, and pollinators also help.
The Potato Grow Pot, as said already, is great to have on the patio and at the price you might as well get two or three of them. The more spuds the merrier. But then again I love potatoes.
© 2011
