Potato Onions and True Potato Onion Seed TPOS

[cletus]

Nice, bill, have you noticed any volunteers around? Apparently they are pretty diverse from seed so you might notice. Spread some of the potato onion seed love and experiment!

[oxbowfarm]

Very excited to see my planting of Green Mountain is going to be flowering gangbusters. About half the plants in each clump are showing flower heads.

[raymondo]

Planted my TPOS seedlings into a large pot. Looking forward to seeing the onions.

[ilex]

I've got the impression that Green Mountain is somewhat self sterile, I would have some other variety in flower around.

[templeton]

I sowed half my Green Mountain seed about 2 months ago. 12 little plants emerged, about 50% germination, and since I'm on extended vacation from my garden I put half in the garden, and the other half in a pot at my mum's place. Looking forward to some surprises when i get home in early spring.
Ox, are those plants from mature bulbs?
T

[oxbowfarm]

Yes, the plants are from mature bulbs fall planted and overwintered in the ground.

I wasn't aware of the self-sterile problem, pretty much too late now to do anything about it. I do have some red "shallots" planted next to them but they are one of the new seed shallot hybrids and are male sterile based on last year. We'll just have to see what happens.

[nicollas]

Hi,

i've a question about how to produce seeds of PO when a scape is emerging. Last season i've got a massive flowering event in my Green Mountain *and* German Brown potato onions that were side-by-side in a bed. I've lost everything due to worst spring ever in France, slugs and bad management ...
(german brown is the only cultivar found in France, dont know more about it)


(just for the beauty - green mountain)

Reading Kelly's garden log, and work of fellow members on true garlic seeds, i've discovered that the scape can be cut and put in a bucket full of water to let it mature and produce seeds. That could have saved my precious seeds last year ...

So i'm asking for advice about at what time can a scape be safely cut to got in the bucket ? It is said that removing scape can make bigger bulbs, so if it is possible it could be a win-win solution letting the plant put its forces into bulbs, while saving scapes to a more controlled area (and even side-by-side with cut scapes of other alliums).
In an article about true garlic seeds, one can see scape in a bucket with flower heads still inside their 'bags' suggesting it could be tested for onions too ?


(garlic scapes in a bucket)

[billw]

Once cut, it is better to have them in a protected location (indoors, sheltered by a wall, etc.), but once they are in a protected location, you may not get natural pollination.

So, unless you are planning to pollinate by hand, I think that it is best to remove the scape after the flowers have opened and the pollinators have had time to do their work.

My potato onions are flowering now and it will be a race between having all the flowers open and the arrival of the first wind storm that will knock them all down. Once the majority of the flowers have been open for a couple of days, I'll cut them off and take them inside to finish.

[nicollas]

What about cutting the scape as soon as possible (when the flowers are still in the bag ?) and let the flowers open in the bucket at proximity of other cut scapes of several alliums ? I guess if the buckets are still in the field, pollinators should do the work anyway ? I'm interested by the "soon as possible" stade because my PO were fall planted and so flowered when the weather was still humid, and slugs eat flower scape at the ground level, so i'm interested in getting scape out of the field as earlier as possible. Maybe i'll try to spring plant so the flowering stade will come in a weather lass favorable for slugs

[nicollas]

All the Kelly's potato onion family (available this year) !



What a pity Kelly didnt postmore pics of his new cultivars on the net, they're beautiful.

[swamper]

I grew Green Mountain and Snow White P.O. bulbs this year. Also Sante, Saffron, Ambition, and gray shallots from bulbs. I grew Camelot shallots from seed.

I allowed the Green Mountain and Sante plants to flower freely and set seed. For what it's worth the flowering process affected the formation of nice bulbs a lot more in Sante than Green Mountain.

In January I will sow seed from both Green Mountain and Sante, I hope to see some crosses appear. I also replanted bulbs from Sante, Saffron, Camelot, Green Mountain, and Snow White.

[templeton]

My green mountain seedlings are showing diversity, with three plants now developing flower buds - some from dividers, some from a single stalked plant.
T

[raymondo]

My potato onions that flowered last year are flowering again. Only one of them, same as last year, but it has divided and each new plant is flowering.

[templeton]

Some pics of the diversity in the Green Mountain seedlings.
There is all sorts of diversity in the amount of division - from single bulbs that look like they are never going to divide, through 2 or 3 divisions, 6's and 7's, right hrough to ne individual that looks like it has 28 individual divisions so far. A bit hard to tell, it's pretty tangled. This individual divided about 6 or 7 times, and now each of those is dividing again. Pity I planted them all so close - rookie mistake.













T

[nicollas]

Wonderfull !

Cant wait to see pics of bulbs !