Ryan Burkitt

I know one can grow sweet potato slips, but I watched a video saying that this can be done with regular potatoes as well. Is it possible to plant just the sprouts/slips of regular potatoes?

Christopher Weeks wrote:My potatoes usually start sprouting months before I can get them into the garden. I just leave them and plant them when I can, even with three feet of dangly stolon or whatever. It seems to work out.

My potatoes have done the same thing, I have sprouts that have grown to about a foot long. Do you notice a difference in harvest when planting potatoes with long sprouts?

Matt McSpadden wrote:Naturally if everyone is selling tomatoes, it is hard to start selling them too. But if everyone else is selling red cherry tomatoes... maybe you should sell orange, yellow, and purple? If everyone else is selling orange carrots, maybe you sell purple or white carrots. If everyone else is selling green lettuce, maybe sell some of the other colors. Stuff like that will make you stand out a bit.

Thank you, definitely helping me see how to market in creative ways

Joseph Lofthouse wrote:The best prices for vegetables occur for first of season produce. If you can have tomatoes or corn ready a week or three before the rest of your village, you can double or triple the price during that time.

That’s interesting I’ll have to consider that. I think I could get corn out at least a week early.

Cristobal Cristo wrote:If everyone sells the same produce you will have to compete by offering lower prices.
In Illinois I would focus on bush fruits: currants and gooseberries grow wonderfully there. Also aronia, elderberry and black berries. They will start producing within two years.

Yeah I’m thinking of going down that route.

Ben Zumeta wrote:I think peas and carrots are great gateway vegetables that really stand out when grown well. Strawberries are easy to grow and also have distinctively better flavor that can win people over from grocery store alternatives or not eating fruits and vegetables. If it would be possible to set up a farm stand near a school, church, or somewhere else people congregate regularly, that could help bring in customers in a dispersed area. I might then have a questionnaire or chat people up about what they’d like grown locally, or what they remember their grandparents growing or reminiscing about.

I considered strawberries, because the pumpkin patch next to my house started out as a strawberry patch and switched to pumpkins 15 years ago. So I know they do sell around this area

I live in a small town in central IL and I’m considering the best produce to sell in my area. It’s mostly corn and soy bean farms around and not a lot of big cities. The only thing that I’ve considered is sweet corn and pumpkins. However, there is already a pumpkin patch 1 mile from my house. But I have considered sweet corn tomatoes, and salad mixes. Anyone have advice?

Thom Bri wrote:

Ryan Burkitt wrote:

Christopher Weeks wrote:

The bean plant won’t strangle the corn too much? I watched a video and a guy did three sisters, but the bean plant over grew the corn and smothered the whole thing plant.

Some, but the corn still produces good ears.

Really cool thanks for sharing did you have to build mounds for the corn?

Christopher Weeks wrote:I *like* my beans to overgrow the corn. They grow to the top, spiraling around and around and then they grow...up. But with nothing to grow on, it falls over and then it finds the next corn plant over and starts spiraling on that one. The bean vines lock the corn together so that when the damned racoons try to pull them over, the corn resists better because the beans and corn form a matrix together that's harder to overcome.

The bean plant won’t strangle the corn too much? I watched a video and a guy did three sisters, but the bean plant over grew the corn and smothered the whole thing plant.

Thom Bri wrote:Depends on where you live. Look around locally for seed sources.
Or, acquire several different varieties and mix them all together to create your own local variety.
Regarding beans overgrowing. I just let it happen. Plant the corn first and when it is well-sprouted then plant the beans. The corn gets a good head start and can pollinate before the beans get too big. Both do well if the corn is not planted too close together.

Thanks, I checked out Bakers Creek seeds and they have a bean variety that only grows 3ft, so I think that would be good for the Montana la ender. But they also have a Delaware tribe variety of flint corn that grows 6-8 ft high. It seems native tribes that lived farther north like the Dakotas had shorter growing corn varieties, but also shorter growing bean varieties. So I feel there are bean varieties that are adapted to corn varieties of the same region.