Kitchen Garden Forum

My Mother-In- Law who lives in southen France has lifted early Charlottes, having cut them open, is this potato blight??

It looks like spraing. But then spraing is no one particular disease or disorder, but a generic term for non-specific internal damage and discolouration caused by shortage of water and / or nutrients. Is it soft and smelly? If it's blight, it reeks like death.

Hi FelixLeither,

I thought the same until I looked at Dr.D.G Hessayon, page 85...
Spraing.. has cured lines.

donedigging wrote:Spraing.. has cured lines.

I'm not sure what you mean by cured lines, but really for a proper diagnosis, donedigging, we need to see what the tubers look like internally by being cut lengthways, and a look at the skin will give more clues. A description of the texture is useful, too: whether they're hard or soft, or yielding in places.

Sorry FelixLieter

I ment " curved". I will ask mother-in-law for more pics and will get back to you.

New photos of mother-in-laws potaoes..as Felix-Leiter requested for a better diagnosis.

Mother-in-law says "the skins are normal looking you wouldnt think anything was wrong until you cut them."

Hello DD
I think that this condition is probably what's known as a physiological disorder - ie a combination of several unsatisfactory growing conditions have combined to produce this effect. Its very difficult to pin the cause down to anything specific but it's often things like irregular moisture content in the soil, hot or cold spells or an imbalance of nutrients occurring as the tubers are forming. Also it can be specific to different varieties. Not much help there then!
Your MIL might be able to suggest something if she can recall how they grew in the Spring.
I think that the tubers can still be used but you probably wouldn't want to as they are so unsightly when cooked.
To avoid this problem next year things like slightly wider spacing, ensuring a good balance of nutrients in the soil and not letting the plants get very dry during the tuber forming stage can help. I always give my 1st E and 2nd E potatoes a feed of Chempak Calcium (calcium nitrate) as the tubers begin to form which always seems to help. This gives them a good boost when they are growing very rapidly. This is a foliar feed and is just watered over the row.

Hope this helps.
Interested to hear others take on this problem.

John

Hi John,
Thank you for your answer and I hope you don't mind that I sent it to MIL.

MIL says

yes , the moisture one I can go along with

I agree it would be interesting to hear others take on this