Checking on my potato plants this morning, it seems they might've been in the early stages of some kind of infection. Some of the leaves are starting to have little black spots all over.
Pruned all this infected(?) growth back ... hopefully that helps, and it doesn't turn out that the severity of the pruning stresses / weakens the plants further, there's still months to go before they're supposed to be "ready" :(
Any ideas if I might have a chance to salvage the plants?
i have no idea about potatoes other than some vague knowledge.
have you grown potatoes in that same space before? do you rotate your plantings to avoid diseases being able to persist?
has it been hot and dry or wet and cool or ?
did you apply compost or use some other amendments or fertilizers or sprays?
it has been rather dry here, if i'd not been able to water i'd not have much of a garden at all right now.
songbird
No, brand new plot. First season growing in it.
mostly hot and dry. Though we did (finally) get rain last week, after a few days of rather awful air conditions thanks to the canadian wildfires.
Wondering a little bit if that didn't stress the plants out. Time will tell if the pruning was enough to save the plants ...
Just some slow-release general fertilizer to mix in with the topsoil / native soil in that plot. I forget the exact N-P-K mix though.
Same.
Could be a few things as mentioned already. Most common cause, black spots on any type of leaves in the Northern hemisphere lately are mould, due to a lot of rain for a while, in the winter/spring, then dry periods. Fungus/mould spores love these conditions.
*You can safely try this. * Mix a tablespoon of Bicarbonate of Soda into a gallon of water, then spray on all over the entire plant leaves. It will take a while to cure, as will not suddenly disappear. Mould needs acidic PH levels to grow, and by using/adding Bicarbonate of Soda, you are changing the PH slightly to be more alkaline, which will stop/kill any moulds spores in their tracks.Another thing, if Potatoes, is use a mulch under the leaves, on top of the actual soil, this helps trap moisture in the mulch, instead of the leaves. The leaves will eventually start to go from green to yellow and fall off, long before end of season, for a few reasons, other than what I mention here.
Another nature product is Neems oil, also mixed and sprayed on, which is safe on any leaf plant, indoors and out, good for a variety of bugs that eat or live in leaves. This is just another in a line of probable causes and fixes.
Well, it's been pretty super dry until we got the rain last week, so I've been watering by hand (and doing my best to water the dirt rather than the leaves).
I'll keep this in mind if I see any more. I cut out a lot of the leaves in hope if it was something, I could get to it before it traveled farther.
This opened up the plot considerably (hopefully not to the detriment of the plants!), so perhaps the additional light / airflow between the plants will help things as well...
Have woodchips beneath them (probably technically wrong to do for a vegetable garden, but it's what I could get my hands on ... and the potatoes grew up through it fine)
Haven't noticed any bug damage ... but I've heard a few references to neem oil -- it wouldn't affect pollinators or anything, right?
Thanks for the ideas :)
Dan Purgert wrote: ...
it won't make any difference for potatoes unless you're planning on collecting the seeds and replanting them.
songbird
Was he wondering about the potatoes not getting pollinated , or was he concerned about damage to the pollinator population ? I did a little poking around , neem oil can cause damage to bees and probably other pollinators if not used properly .
Sorry, yes, I was (am) concerned about accidentally killing off the beneficial bugs from applications of anything ... it's bad enough suburbia here is a desolate wasteland of mowed lawns without me accidentally poisoning them.
Dan Purgert wrote: ...
look into putting up some insect hotels. :)
songbird
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