Is It Blight?

[tattieman]

Marigold007 the spray should be applied when no rain is forecast as it can be washed off. It probably needs 2/3hours to dry on. Give the stumps a small spray with your fungicide mix.

Womble if it is early blight then just snap off affected leaves and spray with fungicide and the plant will still produce a crop. Late blight I would remove the haulm just above ground level.

[womble]

Marigold007 that does look like blight. I was wondering if you had blackleg but the tuber would only have been rotten at one end.

Now that your plants have it I would keep spraying them but if they are flat on the floor just cut and remove them. Blighted haulms will still put energy into the tubers and you should still get a crop. If you cut and remove straight away then they stop growing.

Hope that doesn't confuse anyone.

I thought you were supposed to remove the foliage so the blight didn't travel down into the tubers?
Are you saying to leave them on?

[SarzWix]

I honestly don't know Sabina. I know that the bigger chemists don't seem to keep epsom salts any more, but the smaller independent ones often have it if you ask, and also 2 of my nearest garden centres stock it, alongside the blood, fish & bonemeal, sulphate of ammonia etc.

Marigold, I'm not sure if it's a risk leaving the little stumps of the haulms above ground, hopefully tattieman will be along soon and will know the answer. In the meantime, could you cover them up? With a bit of plastic or something to keep the rain off?

[sabina]

I think that I might have magnesium definency. I am really struggling to get hold of epsom salts. (Mg sulphite). This is going to sound really silly, but is Milk of Mg a viable alternative (Mg hydroxide)???

[srodders]

Sprayed all my tatties and tomatoes with copper fungicide a week ago as a preventative measure. First spotted a bit of blight on Monday and now have only got haulms left on about 30% of the tatties! Fortunately the Tommies are indoors so should be OK. I am surprised at how quick it spreads, even having sprayed them.

[marigold007]

Hi. Thanks for the advice, ya'll. I got some Bordeaux mixture today and went to the allotment. I cut down all the Red Dukes of York and Edzell Blues because they are ready already. One of the Edzell Blue's stems was completely black and going mushy. I also cut down a few of the Charlottes and Belle de Fontenays that were close. They seem ready as well. I picked out the potatoes that were sort of peeping out of the soil. Some of the Charlottes are huge, and now in the pot. Besides that black stem, all the rest that were cut down were standing green with little brown freckles. After clearing the stems and leaves I sprayed the lot, even the ground and where I walked. This can be a nightmare for the obsessive person!

And then it poured down rain after I finished spraying! Do I need to go back and spray again tomorrow because of the rain?

Also, there are a couple of inches of stems sticking out of the ground. Do I need to cut more?

Thanks again guys!

[tattieman]

Marigold007 that does look like blight. I was wondering if you had blackleg but the tuber would only have been rotten at one end.

Now that your plants have it I would keep spraying them but if they are flat on the floor just cut and remove them. Blighted haulms will still put energy into the tubers and you should still get a crop. If you cut and remove straight away then they stop growing.

Hope that doesn't confuse anyone.

[SarzWix]

That does look decidedly unpromising Marigold Make sure you check over the foliage of all your other plants really thoroughly, and take off anything suspect.

[zazen999]

Sabina - have a read through here and esp have a look at tattieman's video. We have the same, but one look at tattieman's video reassured me it isn't blight.

As you can see, quite a few people have this at the moment.

[marigold007]

It doesn't sound too promising Marigold Can you get some photographs?
Tattieman sells a blight testing kit on his website, might be worth getting one, so that you know for sure.
In the meantime, cut off any affected foliage (don't compost it, burn it or put it in a bag in the normal bin), and you can spray with either Copper Fungicide (Bordeaux Mixture) or Dithane 945 to give your other potatoes and your toms a chance.

Hi SarzWix, I'm glad to hear that I don't need to chop down the lot! I'll go to the store in the morning and get some spray for sure. I am attaching a pic of half of the offending potato! It has gotten yuckier since this afternoon!

The bubble and squeak was awesome though!!

[sabina]

They were planted on 13th March. We decided to dig up one of the two plants which have the spots tonight to see what kind of yield we had - around 3 medium size potatoes and 4/5 tiny ones.

I've put some plant food into the container which holds the remaining brown spotty potato plant.

Any further diagnosis or advise would be much appreciated!

[SarzWix]

Afternoon all!

I've found that two of my container grown potatoes have brown spots on their leaves and the foliage is wilting and turning yellow.

It's not appearing to have much effect on the crop - we enjoyed our first new potatoes for dinner last night

I don't believe it's any kind of serious blight or disease.

Is this some kind of deficiency such as potassium and how can I remedy it?

Hopefully the photos should show you more of the issue!

Thanks

How long have they been planted for? The foliage may just be dying down because the potatoes are ready?
If it's not that, try giving them a little feed with some tomato food.

[SarzWix]

It doesn't sound too promising Marigold Can you get some photographs?
Tattieman sells a blight testing kit on his website, might be worth getting one, so that you know for sure.
In the meantime, cut off any affected foliage (don't compost it, burn it or put it in a bag in the normal bin), and you can spray with either Copper Fungicide (Bordeaux Mixture) or Dithane 945 to give your other potatoes and your toms a chance.

[marigold007]

Hellooo? Any body??

*drops rock into deep well*

[marigold007]

I am pretty sure I have blight. A couple of the 1st early Red Dukes of York's haulms have rotted into a slimy mess of yellow and green foliage, with black areas around the intersections of the stems. One of the potatoes have completely rotted on a plate where I was keeping them, over a week's time. While washing the potatoes I dug up yesterday, I found a few that had been damaged. While cutting the bad bits away to make bubble and squeak today, one of the potatoes when cut in half looks like a poster child for a blighted potato. :-(

Some of the Red Duke of York plants surrounding the infected plants had black freckles on them. I pulled them up, but the potatoes are still in the ground. I wasn't very careful about not disturbing the dirt so I guess those tubers are probably exposed. The plants themselves are on a pile to be burnt at a later date on the back of the plot. The one I found last week went into the regular compost pile. What should I do? Burn the regular compost?

I have about 100 plants.

These infected plants are surrounded by Blue Edzells which are ready, Charlottes and Belle de Fontenays that have been in flower for a couple of weeks. And at the other end of the potato patch, I have Pink Fir Apple and Picasso. Should I cut them all down and harvest the spuds beginning in a couple of weeks? Should I get a test kit for something so obvious? Should I start spraying? What's the safest spray? Are my tomatoes that I just planted going to die soon too?

Am I overreacting? Is this regular rot for 1st Earlies? lol.