COMMUNITY TUBER RESERVE NETWORK 

Preserving the tubers of tomorrow's food supply.

Protecting Our Ability to Grow Food

Seeds are essential to food security, but not every important food crop is easily preserved through conventional seed storage.

Potatoes, sweet potatoes, sunchokes, and other valuable food plants can be propagated through living tubers, roots, and other planting materials. Unlike dry seeds, these living reserves require appropriate storage conditions and periodic renewal to remain viable.

The Community Tuber Reserve Network is a Continuity Corps initiative to establish affordable, temperature-controlled storage reserves for these important food crops.

Our mission is simple: preserve sufficient planting material so that communities can continue growing food for future harvests.

We aren't storing tubers primarily for consumption. We're preserving the ability to grow them.

Affordable Storage Without Expensive Facilities

Traditional root cellars can provide excellent storage conditions, but constructing underground facilities requires land, funding, and significant infrastructure.

We believe there is a more practical way to begin.

Our initial approach will focus on establishing small, electrically powered storage stations using affordable equipment, potentially including:

• Repurposed refrigerators suitable for cold-stored planting material.

• Chest freezers equipped with compatible external temperature controllers, allowing them to operate above freezing.

• Insulated storage cabinets or other temperature-controlled appliances for crops requiring warmer conditions.

• Reusable ventilated containers, temperature and humidity monitors, and basic inventory systems.

These stations could operate at participating homes, community organizations, farms, or other suitable locations.

By distributing storage across several locations, the network can reduce dependence on any single facility and gradually expand as resources become available.

Different Crops, Different Storage Needs

Preserving living planting material requires more than simply keeping it cold.

Potatoes

Certified seed potatoes can be maintained under cool, humid conditions, generally around 38–40°F. Proper storage helps preserve their suitability for future planting.

Sweet Potatoes

Sweet potatoes require warmer conditions, generally around 55–60°F, and proper curing before storage. Unlike ordinary potatoes, they can suffer damage when kept in a conventional cold refrigerator. Stored roots can later produce slips for planting.

Sunchokes (Jerusalem Artichokes)

Sunchokes can be preserved in cold, humid storage or maintained as living reserves in managed garden beds. They are particularly valuable because they can regenerate from tubers left in the soil.

As the network develops, we hope to explore additional crops, including American groundnut and yacon, using appropriate storage and propagation methods.

How the Network Will Operate

1. Establish Initial Storage Stations

Begin with a small number of affordable storage appliances, carefully monitoring their temperature, humidity, ventilation, and reliability.

2. Acquire Healthy Planting Material

Obtain suitable varieties from reputable sources, prioritizing disease-free stock, reliable propagation, and crops appropriate for local growing conditions.

3. Preserve and Monitor Reserves

Keep inventories of stored planting material, inspect supplies regularly, remove deteriorating material, and track how successfully each crop survives storage.

4. Renew Reserves Through Cultivation

Because tubers cannot remain viable in storage indefinitely, planting material will periodically be cultivated, harvested, and returned to storage. Participating growers will help maintain these living reserves.

5. Expand Community Access

As supplies increase, the network aims to make healthy planting material available to households, community gardens, and other local growers, helping establish additional sources of future food production.

Starting Locally, Planning for the Future

Our initial goal is to demonstrate a functioning tuber reserve in Stanislaus County using modest equipment and a small network of participants.

We envision starting with a limited number of crops and storage stations, documenting storage performance, successful propagation, and the amount of viable planting material maintained.

As funding and participation increase, the network could develop larger refrigerated storage facilities, including insulated walk-in units or temperature-controlled shipping containers.

Our long-term vision may eventually include dedicated community root cellars or extensive underground storage facilities capable of preserving large quantities of planting stock for entire communities.

However, our immediate priority is making the system work affordably, reliably, and on a small scale before expanding.

Help Preserve Future Harvests

Supporting the Community Tuber Reserve Network means investing in the ability to produce food year after year.

Donations can help provide storage appliances, temperature monitoring equipment, suitable planting material, propagation supplies, and the resources needed to maintain these reserves.

We also welcome potential partnerships with gardeners, farms, community organizations, and individuals interested in hosting storage stations or helping renew planting stock.

A tuber preserved today could become the beginning of many future harvests.

Together, we can help communities preserve not only food, but the ability to grow it.

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