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Why won't potatoes grow?

Pearl Sutton

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posted 5 years ago

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I am losing things right and left in my garden, it's horrifying.
I have potatoes from the store, various types, that I have been sticking in empty spots. They are all sprouty, and growing in the storage area. I plant them, give them a bit of mulch to keep them cool, and they sit there. They don't seem to be dying, or sprouting more, or anything. They are just sitting. It has been hot, but currently is rainy and cooler (below 80F) and they still sit. Is it just too hot for them to consider growing at all? They seem to be growing just fine in the kitchen! I don't expect them to make tubers till it cools, but I thought they'd at least put out some leaves.

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bruce Fine

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I read somewhere that most non organic potatoes sold in store are treated with something to keep them from reproducing

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Good Morning Ms Pearl;
This is easy... Potato's grow in Idaho... You removed the Idaho rock from your garden recently... Silly girl!
Put it back and maybe.. the potato gods will forgive you!

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Pearl Sutton

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bruce Fine wrote:I read somewhere that most non organic potatoes sold in store are treated with something to keep them from reproducing

They are sprouting like they'll grow, and others I planted in spring and last year that were sprouting grew, all grocery store ones...
I know some never sprout, I'd say they are treated ones. I buy cheap, I bet they don't waste money treating cheap ones

All I can think of is the heat....

Pearl Sutton

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thomas rubino wrote:Good Morning Ms Pearl;
This is easy... Potato's grow in Idaho... You removed the Idaho rock from your garden recently... Silly girl!
Put it back and maybe.. the potato gods will forgive you!

Hahaha, that's the best logic I have heard all day!!
:D

bruce Fine

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can't help my green thumb turned black this year, but if theres a fair this year I could probably get a blue ribbon for my weeds

Pearl Sutton

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Bump! I need to figure out if I'm wasting my very limited space if I plant more potatoes. I want them because it's so late to be panting, and they'll handle the fact that it's getting cooler. And might not die of the fungus that is taking out my squash, but not hurting my tomatoes, as they are related to tomatoes. I need storage crops, and it looks like I'm not getting any winter squash this year. I'll buy some, but my garden isn't going to do it.

I also have a thread running about keeping sprouty sweet potatoes, but I know they won't handle a frost and am really not sure they'd do anything before it gets cold, and the soil I'm working with is crappy. I'm fairly sure potatoes will handle a frost or three... And I have a space I can do something with.

The other thing that's thriving is blackeyed peas for some reason, they were just grocery store cheap bags by the pound. They seem to be amok, I'm dumping them in everyplace I can.

John F Dean

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I am about to head down to my garden. I pulled one potato plant a few days ago. The plant had died off. The tubers were smallish. The beets and tomatoes are doing great. The carrots I checked are tiny. I use 2 ft tall raised beds with straw out of my stalls packed in in the fall.

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John F Dean

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Hi Pearl

I just got back from the garden. Beets, potatoes, carrots, and onions are all acceptable. I will probably harvest the potatoes in a week of two and replant. But my pole bean plantsmaybe a foot tall. I suspect you and I have pretty similar weather.

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I have had similar things happen with potatoes, they just stalled and/or did nothing, grew when they darn well wanted to. But your weather is a bit more predictable than mine, and like you said you can expect some good growth in the cool that's coming.
If it were me- I'd do both. Put in a few more potatoes if you have them, and while you still have a good bit of warmth left get those sprouty sweet potatoes in the ground (like Jan mentioned in the other thread). They should establish themselves enough to survive and then next year you will be able to start slips or just redistribute any small tubers.

Rez Zircon

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I'm not sure heat bothers young potatoes much. A week ago I planted some growthy potatoes that I'd forgot about (they already had baby tubers going), and they're leafing up nicely, even tho it's been pushing 100F here. (The ones I planted in early May are about done, for the most part.) I'm going to try an experiment with these and leave them in the ground over winter, and see if being so late they'll keep for spring digging.

Treated potatoes will sometimes eye up, start clumps of baby sprouts, and look like they plan to grow, but it doesn't happen. If you let them sit for a LONG TIME (I've seen it take over a year!) sometimes they will grow, but don't put them in the ground before they get good growthy sprouts -- they'll just rot.

yet another victim of Obsessive Weeding Disorder

May Lotito

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I am wondering if that has to do with the unusually hot july we had. I got totally different results from my potatoes.

First group are the ones that overwinter in the ground, red skinned type and russets. They were volunteers and showed up as soon as the ground warmed up. By late june/early july they were pretty lush but not yet flowered. I needed space in the garden so I pulled them up. And I found lots of full sized potatoes ready for harvesting!

Second group are the one bought from store and I planted them in big containers with compost. So they were a least one month later than the other kind. They seemed to be growing alright but last time I checked no potato coming. Maybe they didn't like the heat and will resume growth when it cools down.

Zone 6, 45 inches precipitation, hard clay soil

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T Melville

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My spring potatoes behaved the same way. Production was nothing to brag about, but they still made food. Here's what we got from about 36 square feet.

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Hans Quistorff

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Consistent moisture in the soil seems to be the determining factor for me. Where the soil did not get wet enough to keep wicking water to the plants they did not grow and produced only a few small tubers.
A volunteer in dry soil at the back of my greenhouse nest to the wall where rain water was wicking in grew fine though spindly due to lack of light.

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Myron Platte

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Bummer! Our potato-onion-chamomile-weeds patch is rocketing along just fine. It hasn’t been especially hot, though.

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John F Dean

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Its official, my potatoes are doing great. I just took up one raised bed with 30 pounds. Two more to go. Then, I replant. To my amazement, my beans are doing nothing.

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Pearl Sutton

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Update on those potatoes: we had a cold snap (below 80 in the day,) and they decided to grow! YAY! I got others planted while it was still cool, I guess they'll come up when they are ready to.

I put some in a pretty fresh pulled weed pile with some seeds for beans, peanuts, squash and cantaloupe. the beans came right up, followed by the squash and melon. No sign of peanuts, no sign of potatoes. Some mushrooms came up though. Was in that area the other day and realized the mushrooms are patterned in a nice neat diagonal grid that matches my potato planting. Crud. Think I lost those.

I'm learning.... :D

Christopher Shepherd

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This year I experimented with our potatoes. We don't use NPK only compost. We just laid them on the ground in a row and covered them in soil. Then I put 1 year old chicken compost on top of that about an inch thick. I then made a 6" hill. They grew quickly and then got froze off. They started growing again and I hilled them when they were about 6" tall. 2 weeks later they were about a foot tall and I hilled them the best I could. They died off completely with the rain ending in early July. It was a bunch of work, but I have the best yield I have ever. Some of them are softball size. The row I did not use chicken poo on only made about as many potatoes as what I put in for seed.

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Myron Platte

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Pearl Sutton wrote:

the mushrooms are patterned in a nice neat diagonal grid that matches my potato planting. Crud. Think I lost those.

LOL! I’m sorry, but this is hilarious. Are they edible mushrooms?

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Pearl Sutton

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Myron Platte wrote:

Pearl Sutton wrote:
the mushrooms are patterned in a nice neat diagonal grid that matches my potato planting. Crud. Think I lost those.

LOL! I’m sorry, but this is hilarious. Are they edible mushrooms?

If they were I'd definitely consider that a win! But no, just some kind of slimy inky caps munching on my taters. :D
This area has a lot of edible meadow mushroom (Agaricus campestris) wish it had been them!

Pearl Sutton

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bruce Fine wrote:I read somewhere that most non organic potatoes sold in store are treated with something to keep them from reproducing

Oooh, I don't think that is a problem this year! There are tentacles in the garage!

And, uh... bless me y'all, for I am a psycho...
That box is sitting on top of another 50 pound box of potatoes, they didn't get stored right last fall.... and I'm afraid to open it and look, the tentacles are coming out the cracks....
I don't have near enough ready to go dirt for them!!

Stacie Kim

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According to this site vegweb, "...researchers in tropical climates have found that when soil temperatures rise above 75°F (25°C), potato plants signal their roots to stop making tubers."

Thanks, Y'all!

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Pearl Sutton

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Stacie: Ah, thank you. That makes sense. It was hot last year when I was having problems.
:D

Stacie Kim

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Pearl Sutton wrote:Stacie: Ah, thank you. That makes sense. It was hot last year when I was having problems.
:D

I experimented with growing my potatoes in containers last year. Black containers. In the middle of a Georgia summer. NOT GOOD. LOl, but I learned lessons along the way. I am "healing" over my potatoes, hopefully to go in the ground tomorrow.

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Pearl Sutton

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I opened that box, as much as I could. Will have to cut the box off....

This is why you are supposed to store potatoes well...
Tentacles! OH MY!!!

May Lotito

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Hi Pearl, I buried store potatoes in ground last winter, they all survive and grow happily. They tend to produce much earlier too, making room for fall crops.

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Zone 6, 45 inches precipitation, hard clay soil

Pearl Sutton

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I planted some today, had to cut the box off to get them out intact, and they were VERY snarled. I saw nothing totally break off, I'm good at untangling things gently.
This is what it looked like when the box was cut off, rather spectacular. I have a couple of people who want some of them. They are very enthusiastic plants, they WANT to grow!! :D

Kristine Keeney

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Howdy!
Those potatoes have definitely been in the presence of and Elder God at some point. Very creepy.
I have my first potato experiment waiting on me. It's a little too warm to grow them here, in theory, but based on what some of the other commentators have said, I have ways to keep the soil in the "EXPERIMENTAL FOODS" bed cooler than it might have been otherwise, so they/it will have enough time to decide what they want to do this year.

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May Lotito

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Quick update: one month later, potato plants are 1 to 1.5 ft tall and starting to flower.
Teach me not to give up on any potato: they will grow!

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Zone 6, 45 inches precipitation, hard clay soil

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