Growing your own food is sometimes a challenge. It is especially challenging when you make a gardening blunder that costs you six months of work! So what did I do and what did I learn? I learnt never to plant potatoes in the same bed as pumpkin.
Let me tell you a little story of why.
Saturday morning. I was all geared up for gardening, because earlier in the week I had harvested a somewhat modest crop of pumpkins and squash. Within the same bed, and in between the rows of pumpkins, I thought I was being quite clever, and planted potatoes. Two varieties, Sapphire and King Edward. Saving space, I thought I was.
Well it was not as clever as it should have been.
How do I know that there should have been more?
Well, I had a control plant! In the other large garden bed that had no pumpkin plants, I had a willing volunteer in the form of a single Desire potato plant that I missed when I harvested last years crop.
From that one plant I harvested about 2 kg of spuds. At this stage, I was excited, thinking that the front bed would have a massive harvest. I was so psyched that I had two 15 litre buckets at the ready.
So on to the front bed where I had sown two bags of seed potatoes.
The potato plants had grown strong during the summer, and there was little difference between the two varieties and the control plant above the ground. All the plants had died off, so now it was time to harvest.
However, after about 40 minutes of hard graft, a few cuts from digging deeply into the bed, all I got for my labour was a couple of handfuls of piddly little spuds. The one I am holding in my hand is the Desire from the other bed. It is not an optical illusion. My hand is resting on top of the other potatoes! The Sapphire and King Edwards are tiny.
Here is my final haul. Only quarter of a bucket. Last year from the rear bed, I harvested enough spuds to fill two of these buckets!
A gardening disaster, six months in the making!
I thought it may have been the dry summer season, but I did water the bed at least once a week to keep it fairly moist, and it was also heavily mulched with pea straw to prevent evaporation. It was quite mild with few days over 40°C, so the plants didn’t burn.
So I did some research. I hit one of my favourite gardening websites, Gardenate, to determine what one should grow with pumpkins. To my shock, all was revealed! It said avoid growing in the same bed: Potatoes.
I wondered why? Then I stumbled upon an extract within Mary Horsfell’s book “Creating Your Eco-Friendly Garden“. In a chapter about interplanting (page 8), she mentions the following;
“I avoid having pumpkin or squash in the same bed as potatoes, as neither with thrive.”
Well there you have it. The mystery of this years pumpkin and squash failure and the following potato famine has been solved.
So repeat after me. I Will Never Plant Potatoes With Pumpkins Again! It’s just not worth it.
But the great thing about gardening is that I can try again next year. Now I know what doesn’t work, I can avoid that problem and should have a bumper crop of both. If anything, this gardening fail has made me more determined. I am so looking forward to the Easter break, as I will be planting up a storm!
What a shame. You learn something new every season. Regards Kathy A, Brisbane
And that is the best thing about gardening Kathy! Learning new stuff.
That’s interesting! I wonder why?
Not sure Bev. I have been doing some more research tonight, but have not found anything new. May be they are both moisture lovers? The bed was quite dry when I harvested.
I guess you can teach an old dog new tricks. Thats very interesting. My potato bed is about 50x50cm and in a pedestal two feet up (Tilly proof). It will be very interesting to see what has grown. So sorry for your loss 🙁 but as Julia would say “moving on”..
Julia?
“Moving On” was Julia Gillard’s campaign slogan and it has now become part of the Aussie vernacular.
Bugger! I feel for you Gave.
It might be time to try the barrel technique where you grow the potatoes vertically in a barrel or stack of tires or similar.
Cheers
MOC
Please don’t grow spuds in tyres Michael. Spuds accumulate heavy materials and so did tyres whilst driving around. It’s a recipe for spuds with lots of added and undesireable extras.
That’s a bugger Gavin! But lesson learned, off to the next failure! 😉
Pumpkins are taking over my garden, they’re like naughty teenagers: climbing into everything, bullying other plants, trying to break out (whahaha lawnmower!)
But since I haven’t made the time to plant for a while, I let them be and give me hopefully another two wheelbarrows of pumpkins before Winter starts. They do keep well after all. Enjoy your planting spree!
Sorry you learnt the hard way Gav. I will learn from your mistake and never grow spuds and pumpkins together. Thankyou for sharing. 🙂
I had seen in Gardenate about spuds and pumpkins together before but had no idea of the consequences I must admit. At least you know why your pumpkins weren’t prolific.
I do recommend 3 sisters planting though.Plant your corn and when it gets to be about 5cm tall (or thereabouts) plant a bean or 2 at the base of each plant. The pumpkins are planted out in there too. As they grow they mulch the corn and beans. The beans grow up the corn and fix nitrogen (jury is out as to whether they fix nitrogen for this generation or the next) and the corn provides trellises for both adventurous pumpkins and the beans. The 3 grow fabulously together. I had 2 of the 3 sisters this year with corn and pumpkins (watermelon will work too) and they worked great together. Spuds go well planted early amongst the broad beans and the beans protect the spuds from frosts too. I tried it last spring and although the spuds were piddly it was due more to lack of water and nutrients than company kept.
Also do not grow sunflowers in the potato bed. Been there, done that, about the same results as you.
Gavin, looks to me like you might have harvested your seed potatoes for your next planting? 🙂
Have a great day!
Hey Gav,
As far as I know potatoes and pumpkins both need al lot of manure.
We grow our pumpkins directly in the manure heap.
They thrive well there. 🙂
Planting both together sounds like a curse to me.
I’ve grown potatoes and pumpkins together in exactly the way you describe( but a much larger raised bed). I’ve had huge success with plenty of good sized spuds and dozens of pumpkins. I use spent mushroom compost which I get from a near by mushroom farm, and irrigate well. I love your blog, thanks.
I kept reading warnings about growing pumpkins and potatoes together but couldn’t track down the reason behind it. This helps! Sorry for your loss, but thanks for sharing it with us. 🙂
No problems Kathleen. I just had to find out what went wrong!
I did not know this fact about pumpkins and potatoes. I had a place i was planning to put them and discovered your article. So this is my question. The farthest apart I can plant my potatoes and pumpkins is 15 feet at the closest spot. Do you think that is too close?