The Farm Town Potato Famine
Posted: August 8, 2011 Filed under: Our Garden | Tags: gardening, potato blight, potato fungus, potatoes Leave a comment »We had an unusually cold and wet spring in our real-life farm town. Farmer D & I were happy that we managed to get a garden in at all. And now that it’s hot and humid, the garden is doing great…except for our potatoes.
The potatoes are looking pretty sad this year.
We planted a mix of Red Pontiac and Kennebec seed potatoes in early June. A couple of weeks ago Farmer D noticed that the plants were starting to wilt. He called our local Ohio State University Extension office and spoke to a Master Gardener. Nick , the garden expert, told D that we had a case of late potato blight.
Late blight was the cause of the Irish potato famine in the 1840s…and is still alive and kicking. Left untreated, blight can destroy entire potato crops.
Oh, no!
