I saw a video awhile back of someone successfully growing potatoes in discarded hay. I acquired some from a local farmer that did not want it anymore.
I cut up some potatoes forming eyes and placed them under the hay. And about a month later now I have potato stalks coming up out of the hay.
The few inches of hay made for enough media for the red potatoes to grow in. So far so good.
The pawpaw tree may give these too much shade. So we shall see when harvesting if they are smaller underneath the tree.
I wonder if the stalks will fall over when they flower. As the dirt gives me them a good structure to hold up the root system. Right now they are too small to fall over but if they do I can stake them and tie them to supports. Next year if this works I plan on adding more hay, the rains matted down what I dispersed so theres more room now.