Doozle, how are your spuds?

[anonymousbird]

Mine have suddenly started to look very sorry for themselves. We haven't had any frost, not even been close since a possible 2 or 3 weeks ago. But this week they have really drooped, leaves browning, very indeed!!!! Boo hoo.

How bizarre! I just came on here to ask you the same thing! I had a look today and mine are exactly the same.

I'm 99% percent sure it's blight - groan.

I dug up a few of the worst looking plants and found some pretty decent size potatoes, given they've only been in the ground about 60 days.

I reckon you may as well take a look at yours. Could lose the whole lot to blight otherwise. At least these can be lifted and stored for a little while.

OH GOSH, blight it must be. I assumed the weather caught them, but of course you are right.

Ah, well, when it is dry either tomorrow or Thursday, I have the last of my main crop to dig up (if they haven't rotted in all this rain!) and I will investigate then..... Like you say, best to get some out now and keep than lose them after all this! My early and main crops were SO healthy and abundant this year, wonder why these have suffered? Hmmm.

Good to hear from you anyway! Will post back in a day or two.

I managed to get all my potatoes up but my tomatoes have just started showing some blight - think all that rain and relatively mild temperatures does the trick.

Yes agree with oldenough.

It was such a dry, hot summer (down south at least) that the earlier tatties were ok.

But now it's done nothing but rain for the last 2 weeks and it's been very mild so I think the fungus has had the opportunity to get a hold.

A couple of the potatoes had rotted but just threw those away. Most of them were fine.

Can't believe how quick they've grown at this time of year though!

Ps. Oldenough, we were trying out Xmas potatoes planted out at beginning of August, so we weren't expecting to pull them up til November. Looks like we won't make it til then.

Were yours planted earlier in the year?

Today is the day, doozle, once it warms up a bit I will be out there to investigate and most likely dig up the beloved spuds.

Fingers crossed!

How did it go?!

Oh gosh, was just about to post and yours popped up!

Beautiful pale perfectly round news, a half decent crop.. Some are just weeeeeny. But can't wait to try them. Curry tonight, and out tomorrow, so it will have to wait until Saturday supper!

That's great. Did you dig them all up?

Just read the title quickly and I thought you were asking me!

Spuds sprouting eyes in the bottom of the fridge as I type - you know the section of fridge I mean, I think it's called The Salad Browner or similar

Doodlez - LOL! Sorry for confusion.

Doozle Yes, got the lot out, didn't have very many plants of them anyway. But got a good several meals worth...

Plants were in very poor condition, so figured best to just get them out.

Doodlez

AB, glad you managed to get a few meals' worth.

I had 9 plants altogether, have dug 3 up. The others look a little shabby but not awful so I might hold off a few more days, just to see. At least all this rain had made the tatties quite big.

The spuds are TO DIE FOR delicious.
Almost like a jersey royal. Sublime, yum.

I'll do them again for sure, despite having to dig early, I don't care, as long as I get to eat them, Christmas, or mid-October, I'm not fussy!

They are nice, aren't they. Have dug up all now and they're sitting in a black bin bag, ready to eat.

I might grow Pentland Javelin as a first early next spring. Not too sure about doing the xmas potatoes again though.

They are a lovely variety.
I might do them again next Autumn - get them in on the early side of mid summer and then dig up around now... just to have the variety from our main crop which I love, but the pure treat of a home grown NEW potato right now is heavenly....

Yes, know what you mean. Looking forward to potato salad this week.

Which maincrop did you grow by the way? Always looking for suggestions for next year.

We had arran (?) pilot as our earlies and Mayan Gold as our mains.

We usually have a "regular" spud as part of our main crop, but this year just did Mayans as they make THE BEST chips/roasties and are an amazing yellow colour. And they crop extraordinaire!!! About twenty tubers per plant, at least, maybe more and can grow to a great size so you get a real mix of biggies (for roasties) and littlies (for chips/sautes). Mmmm. Discovered them about three years ago, did them as part of our main, then half of our main, now they are the whole bloomin lot!

MIL and I (we are the veg gang) figured that mainstream white spuds are so flippin cheap, really, especially direct from our local farmer that we were better off cultivating something a bit more unusual rather than regular whites/maris/ etc. All of which are great, but so cheap to buy, that we thought we would go the whole hog on a slightly unusual variety to grow and store. Never seen them on sale anywhere to buy to eat... no idea how popular they are to grow, but we love 'em!

And they don't seem to get any bugs/blight etc. I lose very few from my pickings.

What about you?

Thanks AB, I'll look into those. I did mainly Charlottes this year which were lovely but were gone in a flash. Need to plant more potatoes generally next year to get bigger crop.