The blight is spreading, unfortunately. I sprayed my plants with neem oil just now.
POTATOES UNDER STRAW/LEAVES #4
Another pic.
I recently added another layer of fresh grass clippings. The fire ants must have moved-in that night!
Yikes - sorry John. You might want to pick thise leaves off and tradh them. DO NOT compost them. Hopefully you can contain it enough to get some taters.
Do you have aphids? Ants love aphids. When I see ants I know to look for those little buggers.
If I could guess, fireants are coming to moisture.
I noticed ants in one of my potato beds today. They'd eaten through one branch of a tater plant. I think I'm going to try mound drenching the bed tomorrow.
Will Neem oil help stop the blight? I think that's what I've got on mine.
Could it be that our vines are dying because it's time?
I dunno Linda. I thought they had to flower first?
Sometimes they don't flower. Some varieties flower more than others, and then I guess within a variety it has to do with weather and other growing conditions that season.
Good call, pod. The grass clippings that I layered on top of the pile were very moist, then it rained a little on Friday. Guess the ants like that type of environment?
Anyway, not sure if neem oil will help but that's what I had on hand, and neem is a good fungicide and the blight is fungal in nature so I thought I'd give it a shot. And yes, it will be mound drench time soon as well. I don't want ants in my potato bed, whether they are bad or not.
This message was edited May 1, 2010 11:21 PM
Thanks realbirdlady - I won't worry so much if they don't flower then;o)
It's either the Yukon Golds or the Purple Vikings that are dying back. There were only two small, uncut, rooted spuds of each per SmPt, and each variety was separated per bag. I believe the Yukons are dying back. Anyone remember which is earlier?
I'm not gonna do any spraying, but will watch the other vine that is starting 2 also die back. Then I'll turn it over 2 see what's underneath!
Linda
Both Yukon Gold and Purple Viking are early potatoes. 60-80 Days
Mine look healthy except for the part that they have some black small spots on the leaves, it really does not look like potato blight but I was wondering the same thing whether this is the first sign that the potatoe leaves are dying or not, mine have not flowered either at all, I planted all yucon gold potatoes in 2 contatiners.
My leaves are curling and turning brown. Not sure why. I did have a large aphid infestation a couple weeks back, plus it's been warm. I probably should have planted them earlier. I did pull one of the Purple Majesty plants yesterday since it looked like it was about to croak and I didn't want it to infect the other taters if it is a virus of some sort. There were several small (new) potatoes down there that look fine. Not sure what is up but keeping a close eye as it is very near to one of the tomato beds. So far the maters all look great and are setting fruit. We have not hit 100° yet this year - very unusual for us - so I hope the taters have time to mature. Next year I will plant them much much earlier!
Potatoes 30 days after planting.
We covered them with sheets the night it got down to 34 degrees, and they made it through the night with only a little bit of frost damage.
Hooray Divided! So glad they made it through the frost.
JohnChrichton75,
Get those ants out of your taters ASAP. They near killed a whole container of my potatoes. I evicted them, but not before they had done some good damage. They put holes in the stems of the plants and broke vines. I think my taters will survive, but I'm pretty pissed.
I know ants like dry conditions, everytime my compost is a little on the dry side they love to make their house on it but as soon as I give it water and is not dry anymore they leave, you might want to try that with the taters as well and see if they leave it alone.
Sapphire- you know what? One of my plants looks like it is dead becasue it is wilting big-time, and has that sad, limp appearace and "feel" of a dead plant. This particular plant is at ground zero of where the ants appear to be nesting. I'll bet they killed it.
I am all out of "mound drench" but will stop by the garden center on the way home tonight! Honestly, I meant to do it yesterday but got side-tracked...
Looking good, Divided.
Uh, my SmPts are sitting right next to my tomato plants. I just realized this proximity when I strolled around this morning...the tomatoes don't look like they're in any danger, although the one SmPt with the questionnable death is right next to some tomatoes...oh, well...
I'm more inclined to believe that the vines are dying back 'cause it's time. I'm gonna backtrack on this thread to see when I actually planted the spuds and count the DTM and determine if the 60-80 day window is shutting....
Linda
I've got only 3 more months to go! You guys are making me nervous with your talk of blight. Lots can happen in the next 90 days. Sorry to hear that you're having problems after you put so much effort into caring for them. That's such a disappointment! Did you guys use certified seed potato and still get blight? :o(
I think we should not panic just yet. It really could just be, "times up!"
Ya'll want me to go dump my SmPot right now and take pics? At least we'd know what's going on down under there...
LMK...
(First, I'm going back to see when I planted them...)
Your potato crops probably have at least 60 days under their belt, Gymgirl, so it's very possible you have something to harvest. Getting anxious, huh? Ha ha ha!
I planted mid-March, so I am pretty sure part of my crop is hosed and I am almost in panic mode, but not entirely. I will buy "mound drench" from the Tent garden place, and get rid of my ant problem this evening. Hopefully the blight is not spreading, but I will know more when I get home. Crossing my fingers...
Linda patience, I am sure if the vine is dying like it is supposed to you'll get taters soon. I would wait until the vine is dead completely brown before harvesting the taters, but I only have 2 pots unlike you so I really want the bigger taters.
John, we don't know that's it blight at all!
I researched on thread #1 and this is what I found regaring our plantout dates:
I planted out on 02/14/10
Carminator1 planted 2/13/10
Dreaves planted a "couple of weeks sooner than we did..."
Steph planted 2 varieties the weekend of 3/3 and then REPLANTED them (smile) on 3/4 (tee hee hee)
Twiggybuds planted weekend of 3/5 (I think)
Becky and Melissa planted somewhere around 02/27/10
Today makes 78 days for me! I'm going outside to see!
Stay tuned!
Never mind...Aunt Beatrix told me to wait until the vines go brown...Carminator1, I'm hearing yah.
Sorry, guys! No peep show today...
Well,
I just went rooting around in my SmPot. I moved the yellowing vine, and it just came right on outta the soil. Looks like the result of some overwatering.
I dug down about halfway on one side of the bag. Nothing there but really, really, really nice decomp leaves. Oh, and a few aphids fell on me....
But, the second vine is still green, and I came away with relatively clean hands, so all is not lost!
Well I definitely have ants. Can't treat them tonight as we have rain and everything will just go right through. Will do it in the AM.
Linda I am so sorry about your yellow vine, by the way I really think I am the queen of panic, I have been known to pull plants out before because they have a few holes on them or yellow leaves etc... I always think the worst. I almost dugged out my entire squash plants today because they are not looking so good.
Thanks for posting the dates, this should give me a better idea on when to expect potatoes.
Wow, that's sort of odd that you have absolutely nothing. The very worst crop I've had ever there were at least some little marble-sized tubers along the roots. I wonder if you were digging right along the edge of the container, and the potatoes are closer to the center (or directly under where their stem is).
I always figure Memorial Day. Just because if I always figure that, then I don't have to actually think any particular year...
Lordy, my squash plants are growing like triffids. I think my neighbors are in for a long summer of huge quantities of produce mysteriously appearing on their doorsteps...
If you wait until they leave their garage door open, you'd make fewer trips....
Or their car doors are open...
Okay. Last night I applied 2 gallons of mound drench on my taters to try to eradicate the pesky ants. We'll see if it works!
John, have you been able to treat for your ants yet?
What is "mound drench?"
Does anyone have flowers on their vines? Joy does -- pretty little purple ones...
It's an organic treatment for ants. I think it's orange oil, molasses, and compost tea.
No flowers here.
No flowers on mine either, wondering if I'll even get any flowers at all.
Steph- I applied mound drench Monday evening. I did 2 gals as well. Before I treated, I disturbed the top of the grass layers in hopes of rousing the ants, but I saw nothing! I was puzzled because I had seen ants and eggs just inches below the top layer over the weekend. I went ahead with the treatment just in case.
What concerns me is that I do not know if they left the potato bed altogether, or if they just retreated down below the mulch to the soil level where the seed potatoes were buried.
They took out a few plants, though. The blight (or whatever it's called) has not affected any more plants as of yet and seems contained.
No flowers here, either.
This message was edited May 5, 2010 9:53 AM
No flowers here either. The plants do still look somewhat stressed but they are alive. Nothing else seems to be affected so I'm hoping it's just our 90°+ heat that is stressing the plants... Surprisingly I have seen few ants so far this year. Last year they were everywhere. Maybe I have less aphids this year with all the ladybugs about? I dunno bit I'm not complaining. I hate ants. They never really bothered my plants except the corn, but they would get on me when I was working in the garden - yuck!
John, I disturbed the top layers of my leaves as well. I saw a few ants out in that container this morning, so I might have to apply more tonight. We'll see.
Here's the site of the damage on the most recent casualty.
