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This is a planter used for making and filling-in holes in earth once potato has been planted. This tool was removed from an old barn at Mockbeggar Farm, Biddenden, Kent, about 1937. The donor suggests that the way to use this tool was to dig it into the ground and push the cross bar down. This would tighten the curved plates so that when it was then pulled out, a hole had been left in the mud and the soil retained in the closed 'jaws' of the tool. The potato could then be planted in the hole and the earth simply dropped back on top, thus filling the hole.

1 potato planter: metal (iron); woodWooden 'spade' handle fixed into iron socket with one nail. Socket narrows into short iron shaft, then divides into two and describes long rectangle. The two bars curve round at the bottom and join onto two curved plates which, when pressed together, form a rough cylinder. The bases of these plates are slightly pointed. A wooden handle with a steel ring at either end - through which pass the two bars of the main shaft - may be moved up and down to open or close the curved plates, utilizing the natural spring of the iron.

Wood, Metal, iron