Wednesday, June 11

Strange potato growth - any ideas?

Any idea what this is? The photos are of potato leaves. Some of our plot holders have noticed that this is happening to potatoes that are growing in ground that was manured at the end of last season. It is mainly affecting top growth. Please help out by posting suggestions in the comments area. Hope that it isn't a virus!


3 comments:

  1. I have just read some rather disturbing information. Apparently the problem could be caused by herbicide residue in the manure that was used. If this is the case when manure is applied to gardens etc. the herbicide is still active and severely affects plant growth in potatoes, tomatoes, beans and peas - in fact most things other than wheat and sweet corn. Some articles report that the residue can remain in the soil for 2 years. Apparently the problems is that the herbicide may be used by the supplier of the straw bedding so the farmer/stable owner supplying the manure may know nothing about its use. I'm trying to follow this up to find more information and sort out whether this is the problem on our site or not. Hope that it is just a scare!
    If you have had a problem after applying manure or any further information on this 'story' please post a comment.

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousJuly 03, 2008

    We are having the same problems. In our case it appears to be associated with hay coming from New York State and Canada where a herbicide to control certain weeds is being applied. There is a British online posting that addresses the problem. We've have to use "new ground" to plant a second garden

    ReplyDelete
  3. We now know the problem is affecting many parts of the UK so it is interesting to see that the problem is not confined to the UK. If you (Anonymous) could email me (use the link on the sidebar) to describe how this is affecting the USA and/or Canada and how it is being dealt with at government level I would be really interested.

    Anyone else in other parts of the world having the same problem?

    See our iformation on the web http://www.glallotments.btik.com/p_Contaminated_Manure.ikml

    July 03, 2008

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for visiting and leaving a comment - it is great to hear from you and know that there are people out there actually reading what I write! Come back soon.
(By the way any comments just to promote a commercial site, or any comments not directly linked to the theme of my blog, will be deleted)
I am getting quite a lot of spam. It is not published and is just deleted. I have stopped sifting through it and just delete any that ends up in my spam folder in one go so I am sorry if one of your messages is deleted accidentally.
Comments to posts over five days old are all moderated.