Potato berries 2014

[DarJones]

I cleaned seed out of about 40 potato berries this evening and got about a teasp.oon of seed. The female parent was a potato I got from Tom in August 2012 that has rich purple skin and creamy white interior. The most likely pollen parent is Chellan which was right beside the purple variety and was blooming abundantly 2 months ago. Both the purple and Chellan were visited heavily by solitary bees. I stood and watched bees flying from Chellan to the purple flowers at a rate of about 10 or 15 flowers visited per minute.

Tom, I don't know the name of the purple variety but it was near the north end (closest to the raspberries) of the 3rd or 4th row. You had 3 plants the best I recall. I was impressed with the plant health, rich deep green foliage, and peeling color. I brought one potato home with me and planted it last year. It made 2 hills of potatoes but no berries. This year, I put in 5 hills and 3 of them made large clusters of berries. This variety is reasonably well adapted to my climate. If I were ranking them, they would be 8 on a scale of 10. The only problem I've had is that they tend to produce an abundance of small spuds but few large potatoes. If you have a use for the seed, I'd be glad to send you most of these. I will grow some next spring and see what shakes out.

I also have heavy berry set on Chellan, some on Azul Toro, and heavy on a couple of other varieties of yours.

[Tom Wagner]

Good! I can always grow out more TPS in the future and I like to revisit some old favorites especially if grown in a different area than mine.

The north part of that row by the raspberries in 2012? I will have to dig out my field books. I would bet it was one of those late maturing lines which would be affected by a hot summer as you have in Alabama.

Chellan did well here last year but the very large tubers it yields tends to have more hollow heart than I would like. It has to be in some new crosses to eliminate that problem.

Can't wait to dig the Chellans down in San Diego and all the TPS seedlings of it and Azul Toro.

[DarJones]

I wound up with one berry from Azul Toro. It was large, plump, elongated, and purplish blue green. There were about 30 seed in it.

[Tom Wagner]

In one of my potato seedlings plots just south of the Canadian border in Washington, a seedling of Azul Toro looks much like the parent line. I made a few crosses of a few surrounding seedlings and hope to use the F-2 Azul Toro next week when it is blooming. I left a video for several interns of the local farms around this area of Whatcom county to review so that they could make crosses in my absence. I invited them to use Skagit Valley Gold flowers since they did not have to emasculate them. SVG cannot self themselves, therefore i am hoping a big group of diploids and tetraploids were used in the cross attemps.

The photo I received from San Diego shows that my seedlings transplanted down there in March are still growing and many have berries.

[wmontanez]

I wound up with one berry from Azul Toro. It was large, plump, elongated, and purplish blue green. There were about 30 seed in it.

Is Azul Toro diploid? I am in berry heaven this year MANY are setting berries including SVG and Azul Toro, Mystery and many others I still need to dig and read the labels from the mounds. I am too excited!

[Tom Wagner]

Azul Toro is tetraploid.

I have a fair number of potato berries coming along, too. Amey Russet has a bunch this year. Sure helps to have certified seed potatoes to do this. I am going to plant a slug of Amey Russet tomorrow south of Portland, OR. Saved some tubers in egg cartons with indirect light room temps since I received them from New York State last April.

[wmontanez]

Azul toro berries are elongated I got confused...


Also, Skagit Valley Gold got few berries...


This year I got plenty of berry set. Amey Russet again this year got berries, Amey azul (a daughter)too. I am really pleased !