On Sun, 27 Feb 2005 00:54:28 -0000, andrewpreece wrote:

"David Rance" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 25 Feb 2005, Tim Challenger wrote:

I was wondering if it would be feasible to grow potatoes from seed. I'm
sure I could get seed from some specialist growers in the UK. I'm not
really looking for any weird or rare varieties, anything other then
"floury" would do. The same goes for onions - Can anybody tell me if I'm
wasting my time, and if not how and when do I start - any hints and tips
would be very helpful.

I have grown potatoes from seed. However you need to realise that you
may not get the same strain as that which produced the seed in the first
place. Secondly the first season of potatoes grown thus will be quite
small.

Oh that doesn't bother me too much - the fun is in the growing as well as
the eating. I can always plant some seed potatoes for dinner ... :-)

The following season will be bigger. In the long run the fun is
in seeing what you eventually end up with.

I was wondering that. it would have been the next question. Assuming I buy
seed from a supplier, do you think they'll be relatively true, or are they
seriously variable, like apples?

Certainly if you grow from seed you are not going to have the usual
infections to which potatoes are prone - not for a few years, at any
rate.

The biggest problem in my garden (northern Austria) is Colorado beetle but
I can pick them off by hand, followed by a bit of common scab, but nothing
really worth bothering about so far.


Having said all that I consider that my experiments at growing potatoes
from seed were very successful and I found it easier than, say, growing
tomatoes.

Really? Well, I can cope with tomatoes.


I concur with this. I grew potatoes from seed I harvested from red Desiree
( IIRC )
potatoes that I let develop those little tomato-like fruits. I planted the
seeds in compost
in a cold greenhouse at the beginning of march, and had small potatoes by
the end of summer,
which were a mix of red and white, so obviously they don't come true from
seed. Easy
enough to grow though, with the added complication of pricking out and
replanting.

Is there any trick to getting them to fruit? My attempts have always wilted
before I noticed any seed pods/fruit in the growth. IS there a trick? Or
did I just stop caring for the plants too early?

Thanks, I think I might well give it a go. Whether I'll try and get seeds
from a supplier or grow my own and see what comes up I don't know.

--
Tim C.