I've worked in huge fields of commercial potatoes. They hill up the plants about 6 to 8 inches.
I've grown potatoes in my garden with no hilling at all and with hills a foot deep. There was no difference in production between the two, the only problem was that a few potatoes were green from sun exposure when they were not hilled.
For most varieties of potato, no roots develop into the soil you hill up around the plant, therefore, no nutrients are being absorbed from that soil. The roots that absorb nutrients emerge from below the stolons. This means your soil should be fertile beneath the planting zone!
Most varieties of potato produce stolons and tubers from a very small area just above where the sprout emerges from the eye of the potato.
The purpose of hilling is to prevent sun exposure of the tubers, not to increase production or bring additional nutrients to the plants.
If you really want to increase the production of potatoes
a. plant varieties adapted to your area.
b. plant large chunks or even whole potatoes, bigger to start with produces bigger potatoes at harvest.
b. Plant them 6 to 8 inches deep in very fertile soil with ph about 5.5 to 6.0.
c. increase the plant density, tuber size will go down, but production will go up.
d. water them as needed, potatoes do not tolerate drought.
e. Hill them up 4 to 6 inches deep to prevent tuber greening.
f. Harvest them promptly, this significantly improves quality.
This year I grew Kennebec and got about 4 pounds per hill on average. That was the best production from the 10 varieties I grew.
For those getting low production on Yukon Gold, I had about 3 pounds per hill this year which is pretty good for this variety.
I plant most varieties about 10 inches apart in the row with rows 42 inches apart. The exception is Russian Banana which I plant 6 to 8 inches apart because the plants are much smaller than most others I grow.
DarJones
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