[rugbymad40]

I need to find a source of potato sacks to store my main crop of spuds.  I have tried a few local stores but they have nothing suitable.  Any suggestions from anyone?  At present even e-bay don't have anything suitable!

[milkman]

The organic Gardening catalogue supply them, alternatively try your local convenience store to see if they can put them by for you as the plastic bagged potatoes are delivered to them in paper sacks...

[John]

I think we got ours from Thompson & Morgan - go for the hessian sacks, they let your spuds breathe.

[shirazcat]

Hi all,  
                Visit your local fish & chip shop, they are usually only to glad to get rid of the sacks that their potatoes come in. These are the correct type of double layer paper sacks that you need. If like me, you happen to be there when the potatoes are being delivered the driver often has dozens of empty sacks for disposal  

                                     Adrian.

[James]

Some councils (like South Cambridgeshire and Southwark) provide you with large brown paper sacks in which to place your garden waste.  Perfect.

[shaun]

if you have a word with your local greengrocer ,chip shop or hotel they have loads of small blue plastic boxes that they have mushrooms in these are brilliant for storing spuds and onions they stack up and you can have a quick sort out from time to time for bad crops,

[John]

Great tip Shaun - thanks

[noshed]

I keep my spuds and onions in the cardboard boxes we get paper delivered in - the A4 stuff, not the 1 ton reels. They are dark and airy. Seem to be OK.

[Oliver]

if you have a word with your local greengrocer ....  small blue plastic boxes that they have mushrooms in these are brilliant for storing spuds and onions they stack up and you can have a quick sort out from time to time for bad crops,

Local Greengrocer? whats that? The last time we had a local greengrocer was about 20 years ago.  :shock:  Sad but true

However, as for the blue boxes - I would not store spuds in them because they are not dark - light can get to the spuds and light makes them go green. Green = not edible. So bags is best. We have a local potato farmer who lets us have bags. We can't get Ecosacs anymore (we had to buy them for 60p each from the District council!) because they have withdrawn them in favour of selling brown wheelie bins which are emptied once a fortnight. A weekly garden waste cart no longer comes to the village either - 'its more efficient to collect wheelie bins from each house'.

Now - what do you do if you have no access from the back of your house to the front? Where does this wheelie bin live? How does one get ones green waste from the back to the front. What do you do with the excess green waste when the bin is full and awaiting collection? Take it to the dump yourself, of course!

[shaun]

ohh not the wheelie bin debate(we have 2 large bins 2 boxes and a plastic bag for plastic bottles)
i have a transit pick up that comes with my job and if i go the tip with rubbish i need to apply for a ticket,also trailers over a 1.5m long and all vans,
a couple of weeks ago i took our broken dish washer there and it became a stand off because i didnt have the ticket, in the end they let me in .the likes of this only makes people fly tip down country lanes. the councils are always going on about recycle this and recycle the other then come up with ideas like this  :evil:

as for the plastic boxes you have to keep them in the dark i throw a old blanket over them no green spuds to date

[Oliver]

... wheelie bin debate :evil:  and  ... as for the plastic boxes you have to keep them in the dark i throw a old blanket over them no green spuds to date

We should not get started on the wheelie bin thing, it could get out of hand! but I am convinced that this brown bin thing is the precusor to the compulsory wheelie bin for usual household rubbish, then everyone will have one living outside the front door. Grrrr horrors.

She has a good source of blue boxes (a local firm gets bread delivered in them) so she must have a go at keeping spuds. Old blankets - good use for them! - been in the loft ever since the duvet revolution 30 years ago!!! thanks for the tip

[John]

We have three bins - black for rubbish, grey for some recycle stuff and green for paper.
Travel down some roads in town and you have rows of terraced houses hidden behind a row of bins.
Our's sit on the front because we don't have easy front to back access. The bins are collected every 2 weeks and I'm pleased to report or black bin is not very full and the grey bin is bulging on collection day.
As for garden rubbish, it's my precious compost material.

[mellowmick]

the precusor to the compulsory wheelie bin for usual household rubbish, then everyone will have one living outside the front door. Grrrr horrors

Just started that here, following a trial run in Edinburgh (in the posh New Town of all places) where the residents took the Council to court but lost. Now they have the big Euro bins (like mini skips on wheels) in blocks of four in front of their houses. Pity Adam didn't design bin stores to go with the Georgian town houses.  
Next will also be individual billing, where your bin has a bar code and the bin lorry measures its weight and you are charged for the weight of rubbish you produce. This will probably hit commercial users in the next couple of years, then be rolled out domestically.

[John]

They talked about individual bin weight charging on the Isle of Man, some interesting problems arose.
If someone puts something into my bin that I pay for, I suffer a loss - is this fraud?
If I am behind on the bill what happens? I think the council is legally obliged to collect anyway.
The admin cost of individual waste billing was huge.
The family of 4 makes more waste than the old couple next door... is this penalising the family?

Is anything simple

[jgsmuzzy]

I need to find a source of potato sacks to store my main crop of spuds.  I have tried a few local stores but they have nothing suitable.  Any suggestions from anyone?  At present even e-bay don't have anything suitable!

Here you go, I think that these will last  acouple of years!

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=180017430661