October 14th 2023

Hilling potatoes

This week I was doing some research on hilling potatoes. There’s talk of growing spuds next season and I wanted to see if we’d be able to hill them with our new cultivator, and wanted to do some trial runs to see where we might set all of the adjustments. I glanced through some notes and read a few articles online and was surprised to find that you only hill them a few times after planting and you only hill them until they begin to flower. After that you leave them alone as tubers start to form after the plant flowers. I find it completely fascinating that all of the preparation happens before the potatoes even begin to form. All of the work is done. And then you wait. It sounds simply mad to put in all of the work without any real inclination as to whether it’ll be a success or not. But how many times in my life have I hilled (metaphorical) potatoes, and looked absolutely mad, because I believed it would be fruitful? Because I just had to hope that some good would come of it, even before anyone else could see it? Sometimes you have to put in the work before things even take shape. Sometimes you have to prepare and have heart that things will grow. Learning what I can control and what I can’t has been an ongoing and likely eternal lesson. I can not make potatoes grow, but I can hill them, even before the first bloom opens I can live in the certainty of spuds.