- This topic has 12 replies, 4 voices, and was last updated 13 years, 9 months ago by .
-
Posts
-
No sooner had I bought a few potatoes to plant for Christmas new potatoes than the allotmens were hit with blight. My question is will it be around to impact on them when they show through if I plant them now? Or should I plan safe and plant them in a container in the back garden where space is truly limited?
I am not sure, has anyone else tried this? I have always avoided late season new potatoes for exactly this reason, but they may escape it through the vigour of their young foliage and then by the weakening of blight spores as temperatures drop in autumn.
I think that whoever sells the tubers should give advice on their susceptibility to blight (or otherwise)…Thanks Charles
I have checked the RHS web site and they do say that you need to ‘protect against blight’. So glad I only bought £1 worth, which I will not bother to plant. RHS line is that they dont know enough about blight to understand how long it sticks around so late new potatoes must increase the risk of it remaining in the soil. So lesson learnt about impulse purchaces
This is interesting, the RHS saying ‘protect against blight’ is not immensely helpful (!) but your comment about blight surviving in the soil is fortunately not what happens. British blight, unlike the one they have in the USA, does not survive in soil or compost, which is why it is safe to compost blighted leaves, stems, tubers and whatever. I do, and even spread that compost in the tunnel where I grow tomatoes, and they are fine so far… it is all about keeping leaves dry because blight spores are just abundant in humid, warm air such as we have at present, and the spores can propagate only on leaves which are damp or wet for a certain length of time, just as those potato leaves probably (not definitely) would be in September. I would plant a few to see, since you have the tubers, and let everyone know what happens.
That’s interesting Charles – particularly as Monty Don was telling us all to burn blighted tomato plants on Friday night. I’ve followed your advice to compost blighted potato foliage. It does make sense, because as you say, blight spores are airborne.
I think that both the RHS and Garden Organic [and Monty Don] give advice as they don’t think that gardeners have any good practices. They tell us not to compost blighted foliage as blight can survive on live foliage of either potatoes or tomatoes – they think this is what we have in our compost heaps!! I had a similar thing with adding compost in the autumn. Garden Organic were telling us to add it in the Spring as nutrients are leached out in the winter rains. I asked at the AGM last year why this is their advice when people like Charles and Alys Fowler were advising putting it on in the Autumn. After evading the question a bit they finally admitted that well made compost is not water soluble and is fine put on in Autumn but we might not have well made compost!!! We are taken for mugs I think!
I wonder who advises Monty? It is a shame because of all the pollution from unnecessary bonfires and loss of organic matter.
I like these last two comments! It is indeed a problem for big organisations, that they have to be (over) cautious in a way that we don’t.
Bluebell, blight arrives on leaves first and then infects tubers through sap in the stems, so I think your plastic may not help, but it will prevent your tubers going green at least, and the drier weather now may mean you have a healthy yield, good luck.
Intriguing! I wonder how they avoided blight, possibly because it is less vigorous in lower temperatures – but then as you found, there is frost to consider. Planting potatoes in late summer is another option from the sound of it, to use space after July harvests: what was your planting date? and were the tubers prepared in some way for autumn growing?
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.