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Post by nathanp on Mar 15, 2016 20:21:12 GMT -5
I think keen101 is correct, that sweet potatoes have more of these traits adaptable for what you want, as long as you have a long enough growing season and heat. They like it warm.
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Post by gilbert on Mar 15, 2016 20:50:21 GMT -5
Hello Nathan,
Thanks as always for the advice! Your posts always help me to clarify things and sort it out. And you are right about Durgan; but that is certainly a beautiful photo sequence! And I'm sure it explains why most people don't get any success with a potato tower.
I'm gong to be working on figuring out the ancestry, etc. of various potatoes, using the many links you posted on this thread. I may get time to do some work on that tonight.
As far as your points in the second post: I am sort of splitting this project in three parts. One part, focusing on getting the most potatoes possible per square foot, will for now use commercial varieties, in some sort of stacked or layered contraption. Layered towers, Tom's idea of pots on shelves, potato pyramids, containers stacked into pyramids, and living wall or strawberry tower style structures are all on the agenda for testing. This will make the potatoes' "clumpy" nature a non-issue. I will still have to deal with the erratic temperature and moisture conditions, and the relative lack of nutrients, in any container system; to do that, I will be experimenting with different varieties, different growing mediums, and different olla or wicking type irrigation and fertigation methods. This will be a fairly challenging project, since many layered towers, let alone unlayered ones, have failed. Basically, this draws on the line of research Joseph started: so much sun per square foot can only produce so many calories even if every other limiting factor is removed. But a tower has more surface area to use.
Part two is the really challenging part; breeding a potato that can set tubers all along the stem or in some other way fill a deep barrel. I think this is a very important breeding goal, but as you point out an entirely untried one. I see it as the difference between pole beans and bush, or determinant and indeterminate tomatoes; one is good for commercial fields, one is good for home gardeners. If we could obtain such a potato, it would cut down on the amount of seed that would be needed to fill a tower, and could potentially be a real game changer. But I agree that it is like hitting the lottery. I'm willing to fool around with this for a long time. My hunch is that the winning potato would be able to speed up the tower height, setting "nubbin" tubers all the way, and then spend the rest of the summer growing a huge tall top to fill them all with calories.
Part three is brought up in your last post: really, in the end, I'm most interested in seeing how many calories I can possibly get from a small area. So I'm going to try lots of other tuber plants. The problem with sweet potatoes is that yes, I don't have it warm. But Sand Hill preservation center has a huge selection of rare, short season sweet potatoes. And my towers should keep things hot, and could be draped with fabric or plastic to keep out frosts.
We will see.
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Post by gilbert on Mar 15, 2016 20:55:42 GMT -5
Another point is that it may be easier to breed a cold tolerant sweet potato then a tower growing Irish potato! At least quite a bit of work has been done on the sweet potatoes!
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Post by gilbert on Mar 15, 2016 22:52:01 GMT -5
The TPS mix I ordered has andigena genetics in it; that is a good sign.
Oikios tree crops sells some potatoes that become perennial by spreading out into a big patch and overwinter. Those might be good candidates for me. They are really expensive, but I might go ahead and order a few.
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Post by gilbert on Mar 15, 2016 23:32:45 GMT -5
A problem to solve:
in a layered tower, if the seed potatoes in lower layers are placed near the edge, they will be more prone to drying out at critical points and failing to yield. (Since all commercial varieties produce near the original tuber.) If they are placed deep within, they are more likely to rot before they get to the edge.
How to solve this?
Transplants that can be placed sideways as the tower is built? Started in decomposing pots? Letting the sprouts get really long before planting? Sticking some kind of tube into the side of a tower, dropping a potato down it, and then pulling out the tube as the potato grows along it toward the daylight?
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Post by nathanp on Mar 16, 2016 6:15:53 GMT -5
Oikos appears to have the SISU x ajanhuiri clone. I have that one, as well as some offspring from that. It is most definitely NOT diploid, though. They are getting that from literature they read. It is probably tetraploid. I've never seen it overwinter, though a lot of purple's seem to, so that would not surprise me. Most x ajanhuiri's have some tuber frost tolerance of varying degrees. It may be the same clone called Vitellotte Grande in Europe. Probably was actually an x ajanhuiri backcrossed to a tetraploid commercial somewhere in it's history, resulting in a tetraploid, not diploid (or triploid). I would not recommend it for deep burying. It spreads stolons broadly, but is determinate. Probably about 110-120 days, what I would classify as long season, but still determinate. oikostreecrops.com/products/perennial-vegetables/ecos-purple-potato/I have TPS plants crossed from SISU to Tom Wagner's MAGIC DRAGONS, which is a diploid. The offspring are tetraploid with high skin bitterness. I am growing out the F2 generation this year as well as about 15 first year TPS tubers to replant. The cross was made looking for frost tolerance.
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Post by paquebot on Mar 16, 2016 12:17:58 GMT -5
In 2009, there was quite a discussion on IDig about potato towers and how potatoes grow. Durgan, who was later one of few who was ever banned from there, refused to believe anything other than his probable one-time experience with growing potatoes. I don't know if it were that thread or a later one where John Best proved otherwise and even surprised me. He buried the stem of a plant and it developed roots and stolons from a stem node. As I recall, the variety was Kennebec. I could no longer find any links to John's web site and suspect that both he and his site may both be gone.
Martin
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Post by nathanp on Mar 16, 2016 18:11:04 GMT -5
He (and I) have had to be warned on Tomatoville over that issue. He usually just seems to report the same pictures and copy/pastes the same wording in his posts...
I have grown Kennebec but never seen that trait. I do have several that would be possibilities. There are at least two tomatoville threads on the subject, one of them shows pictures of Papa Chonca growing potatoes off the stem, another few pictures show Papa Chonca setting tubers throughout a 35" tower. There are pictures of several other potatoes there that set tubers off stolons quite far from the plant center. Some will do so 6 feet or more from the plant. Ones with andigena heritage or phureja heritage have those traits. And the chilotanum tubersoum groups as well.
I have not looked for the subject on idig ... I usually avoid that site due to the militaristic pro-GMO lobby there. Turned me off completely.
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Post by gilbert on Mar 16, 2016 18:39:38 GMT -5
I ran across Nathan's pictures of the Papa Chonca variety tower, very impressive.
And yes, I now realize that one of the people disputing Durgan was Nathan on Tomatoville!
I ran across a very interesting video where a woman and her little sons tip over a potato barrel; and there are potatoes right at the top, maybe two feet above the bottom of the plant. But she was unclear what variety it was; it could have been Red Lasoda or Chieftains.
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Post by nathanp on Mar 16, 2016 20:21:55 GMT -5
Gilbert, you'll see several others disputing Durgan's position in those threads, including Tom Wagner, Doug Strong, Trixtrax, and Wmontanez. Each of which has more experience than I do with potatoes, by a lot. Did you see this older thread? linkKeep these names in your hat to ask for from USDA-Grin ... Herm 18, Guincho Negra - these both spread stolons over 6'. I highly recommend record keeping using a chart something like this. I have done this the past several years. This was from Wmontanez, and become the model for mine.
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Post by paquebot on Mar 16, 2016 21:25:07 GMT -5
Nathan, don't be afraid of IDig. It's just a boring extension of Tomatoville now that it's owned by Mischka. It's become the least exciting and informative of all garden forums. Ten years ago, one GW member said that she wouldn't post on IDig since the readership numbers were too low. What a difference time and reality makes!
Martin
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Post by gilbert on Mar 16, 2016 23:06:43 GMT -5
Hi Nathan,
I just read through the original link. Have to wonder what is bugging Durgan!
I will keep those names in mind. And I just looked up the chart by Wmontanez, looks good.
Just thinking; if I can breed a potato that sets well all along the stem as it is hilled, that could make in ground yields much higher too, if one wanted to do deep trench planting.
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Post by gilbert on Mar 16, 2016 23:17:51 GMT -5
McIntyre: another potato to try.
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Post by paquebot on Mar 17, 2016 1:14:05 GMT -5
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Post by nathanp on Mar 17, 2016 6:09:38 GMT -5
Martin - that one refers to an earlier post. Any idea what the earlier one is? I did see him use the word 'probably' - I've never observed that before.
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