Dying potatoes

sussexbaker

Hi all

The shadow of death has recently passed over my potato patch and it continues to claim victims. The first plant collapsed quite early on and I assumed it was the victim of slugs or a stray hose being hoiked across it. However the second one didn't seem to have fallen victim to such an accident/pest so I started to get worried. Now a third plant is on it's way out so I thought I really need to find out what's going on. All three plants are on the same row, the first was in the middle of the row and the plants on either side are fine. The second was at the end of the row with only a plant on one side, and that's still fine. The third is similarly in the middle of the row with a healthy plant on either side.

The symptoms seem to be the same, I come out and find the plant collapsed. The stalks have black areas where they've collapsed. I thought it might be them planted too close togther however the second one was quite a way from it's neighbour (atleast the sowing distance recommended) so I'm assuming it's not that. I hope it's not something in the soil though as these are my pioneer crop to clear out the area prior to me building raised beds there next year.

I've put some photos here.

I hope someone can tell me what's wrong with them!

djohn2002uk

Looks like Potatoe Blackleg to me. Look it up on google.

sussexbaker

!!!!!!, it does really. Bit gutted as the seed potatoes came from Thompson & Morgan so should have been infection free

toni_

yep id say it was blackleg, I had this last year on the charlotte seed potatoes I bought from Thompson and morgan, dig out the affected plants quickly and you might stop it spreading but mine just caught it one after the other, such a shame

sussexbaker

Strangely enough my Aunt appears to have it on her farm in Devon, obviously the weather isn't helping.

So I need to dig out any plant with curling leaves? At the moment it only appears to be Kerr's Pinks affected but some of my Arran Victory have curling leaves so wondering if I need to get rid of those. I did chit them all together.

sussexbaker

Is there any point me contacting Thompson & Morgan about it?

splodger_seedswapper

i lost a row of my earlies to blackleg this year - it's easy enough to id - as the seed tuber rots and then the stems (underground) go very soft and rot - thus causing the haulm above to wither, yellow and die

i dug up the whole row - salvaging the spuds that had formed - then put all diseased parts of plants in bags and removed from site

it only happened on one variety thankfully all other spuds are doing well.

just goes to show that even trusted seed suppliers can't always be trusted - i certainly won't be using T&M again.

[Deleted User]

I had a dying problem with some of tuckers seed potatoes, not blackleg. I cannot blame the supplier as the seed potatoes looked perfectly good. A lot of disease appears to have been harbored within the seed and I am not surprised after last year. I think this is going to take a couple of good growing years to eliminate