Previous years potatoes

[gregman]

Hello, I'm on my second year of growing potatoes and this year when harvesting I was surprised and confused. The first year me and my son planted red potatoes as they were all the garden store had left. We harvested a decent amount of small to medium sized red potatoes. Harvesting was so much fun for us, we knew we would be doing it again this year. We got an earlier start and bought some yellow potato seeds this time. We planted in the same two sections as last year. Plants this year grew much taller and even produced true seeds. One section we harvested late August and noticed a few red potatoes from last year that we must have missed. Understandable. Last week we went to harvest the second area and couldn't believe there were no yellows and all were reds and they were huge and plentiful. Now the plants grew right from where we planted, but all were the breed from the previous year. We just looked at each other and scratched our head in disbelief. Could the yellow seeds have been reds mixed in, but not appear red? I can't come up with any logical conclusion. Any ideas?

[DoubleDogFarm]

Could the yellow seeds have been reds mixed in, but not appear red

Your post is a little hard to follow when you switch between the words seed and true seed.

TPS - are seeds harvested from the tomato like fruit on top.

Seed potato - Are tubers harvested below the plant and used for cloning.

Tubers, as far as I know, clone identical tubers.
TPS, have 16 variations or more.

I have a feeling you missed red potatoes in both areas and for some reason all the yellows in the late bed rotted, didn't germinate.

Welcome to Helpful Gardener
Eric

[gregman]

Sorry. This years plants produced true seeds at the flowers. All seeds planted were tubers. Your conclusion is the same as mine, but the fact that the plants came up exactly were I placed the tubers made it to much of a coincidence to not question with more knowledgeable people. Thanks for the response.
On another note, I plan on starting my true seeds this coming February and was wondering if I get lucky and get some small tubers, should I plant them the same season or save them for the next growing season? My plan was to try both, but was wondering if there's a rule of thumb. I appreciate the feedback.

[DoubleDogFarm]

On another note, I plan on starting my true seeds this coming February and was wondering if I get lucky and get some small tubers, should I plant them the same season or save them for the next growing season? My plan was to try both, but was wondering if there's a rule of thumb. I appreciate the feedback.

Tom Wagner is someone you should research. YouTube videos and Tater-Mater.

Starting potatoes from TPS is no harder than tomatoes from seed. I've done hundreds of both.

I harvest and winter over the mini tubers. Plant them March the following year.

Here is a post from March 2012
https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/vi ... hp?t=43399

Eric

[gregman]

Thanks Eric. Lots of info there. I plan on planting my TPS's this winter. I guess I won't know if they will be red or yellow since they came from the area where I got both types. You posted some awesome pictures. Wish I had that kind of space here in Jersey. I tell people I grow potatoes in my garden and I get funny looks. Most people here stick to the tomatoes, string beans, squash and cucumbers.

[DoubleDogFarm]

I'd rather have a potato than a tomato. I do grow a few tomatoes, but don't understand the hype of growing dozens of varieties each year.

I'm growing towards no-nonsense just grow food gardening. Not really sure why I'm messing with TPS. Dry beans, potatoes, squash, storage onions, and flour corn are the top list.

Eric

[gregman]

Eric I noticed in your great pics you had a harvest similar to mine with different color potatoes from what you believed were from the same plant. You were surprised at the time and I was wondering if you have come up with any conclusions as to why this happened.

[gregman]

I tried onions the last two years, but I can't seem to get them much larger than a golf ball. I think I'm harvesting too early [early Sept]. I'm going to try one more time and wait until October or first frost which is right around that time.

[DoubleDogFarm]

Tom Wagner would be better at explaining it. YouTube video is interesting.
[youtudotbe]https://youtu.be/8jMXPMO942o[/youtudotbe]


Something like 16 variation in each TPS. Only tubers "clones" breed true.

Eric