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Post by reed on Apr 2, 2016 4:19:09 GMT -5
More of my TPS have come up, apparently they are not difficult to sprout. They are in a mix of 1/4 garden dirt and 3/4 peat with a little bit of vermiculite. I wonder if I should feed them?
I cleaned the fish pond filter and saved the muck which I have used on other kinds of seedlings or I could dissolve a couple of chicken turds.
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Post by nathanp on Apr 2, 2016 8:00:43 GMT -5
Feed from the bottom up, don't water/feed from the top. I water once per week with a small amount of 5-1-1 fish meal fertilizer in the water. Watering from the bottom trains the roots to go down. I am sure your muck would do nicely. I have also used waste water from my fish aquariums.
Transplant to larger containers when the second set of true leaves appears, and bury all but the top set of leaves.
Keep lights as close to the leaves as possible. When they are small, I keep the bulbs an inch above the leaves.
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Post by reed on Apr 2, 2016 9:38:26 GMT -5
Thanks, a little fish poo it is. I don't have lights, it has been warm enough here I just started them outside in direct sun and cover with a thick blanket at night. The bright red ones changed almost immediately to dark green with some maroon overtones. The green ones are just green. Don't know that color matters one way or the other but it's cool to see.
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Post by reed on Apr 2, 2016 14:27:43 GMT -5
Yes, reality really can intrude on one's plans. I planted 3 seeds per in the upside top half of water bottles I collect at work (20 of em). Every one has at least two up and several have all three. If I wanted to really trial and track I would have to narrow those 50 or so down to not many more that a dozen. I think this year being my first I will plant all I can more crowed than might be ideal for production in hopes of just increasing seed. Draw back of course is I may not be able to know for sure which potato came from which plant. So far the only selection criteria I see (and it may not be a good one) is that some have quite a bit of trouble breaking out of the seed shell.
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Post by reed on Apr 17, 2016 5:55:40 GMT -5
Some of my TPS plants bleached out white and died. Almost like you would expect if grown under lights and not acclimated to the sun except they came up outside in the sun to start with. Maybe they skipped class in chlorophyll 101, heck if I know. Good riddance to them in any event as others have nice dark green leaves and have really started to take off growing good.
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Post by raymondo on Apr 17, 2016 16:20:03 GMT -5
... Good riddance to them in any event as others have nice dark green leaves and have really started to take off growing good. No point in mollycoddling such plants. |
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Post by reed on May 20, 2016 17:37:22 GMT -5
Nice looking crop you have there. I only have a dozen or so, so much less chance of finding something really noteworthy. I do have diversity of colors on the stems, most green, some red and a couple bluish / purple. I planted mine out on April 20 and haven't noticed rapid growth, that could be because there hasn't been a week of sunny days total since then. Here is what one looks like as of today yesterday. Don't know what is chewing the little holes in the leaves, looks like maybe flea beetles but I haven't actually seen any.  |
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Post by reed on Jun 13, 2016 5:01:13 GMT -5
My TPS plants are taking off and growing nicely but I don't think they like it as hot as it has been being. One wilts rather severely every day and looks good in the mornings. I don't know if it is just the heat or if something is wrong with it and I should cull it out. I hate to do that because it has very stout dark purple stems that I think are interesting. Since it came from seed and no others are having the same problem I'm hoping it is unlikely to be a disease problem. Guess I'll just keep an eye on it for a bit longer.
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Post by reed on Jul 4, 2016 4:38:00 GMT -5
My first flowers on a TPS plant.  |
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Post by ferdzy on Jul 4, 2016 12:04:57 GMT -5
Wow! What a lovely colour. Got a little flea beetle (?) trouble there though, I see.
EDIT: oh duh, yes you already remarked. Could be leafhoppers too?
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Post by robertb on Jul 8, 2016 5:08:06 GMT -5
What's the variety? Is it a first or second year plant?
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Post by reed on Jul 8, 2016 7:15:57 GMT -5
Yea, it's flea beetles. Don't really know the variety. It's first year from some of Joseph's seeds, I think the one he called Bountiful. I'm looking forward to seeing what the taters look like.
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Post by nathanp on Jul 8, 2016 22:21:49 GMT -5
The red stem color is a hint it could have pink in the flesh. What color are the anthers in the flower?
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Post by reed on Jul 9, 2016 7:54:26 GMT -5
The anthers are yellow, what does that indicate? Yesterday's storm beat them up pretty bad, even knocked a couple flowers off hopefully I'll still get seed. How about the plants with purple stems will they make purple potatoes? And the ones with green stems?
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Post by nathanp on Jul 9, 2016 22:49:52 GMT -5
The anther color tends to be more indicative of flesh color than anything. Yellow anthers usually means yellow or white flesh. Red or purple in the anthers corresponds to some red or purple flesh.
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