[Zippy]

Is this blight?  It is from a container grown potato plant.
The whole plant has wilted with leaves showing brown spots as shown, but not brown and curling from the edges like I expect blight to look. Weeds in the same pot are green and erect, so not sun scorch or lack of water. It is one of two affected plants in a total of six pots in my yard.

My allotment plants are fine as are my fellow allotmenteers’.  Blight doesn’t seem to have hit the town anywhere I know of so it seems strange that I should have blight in just two pots at home in a garden surrounded by six foot walls in an area where no-one gardens very much.

[goodegg]

its not potato blight, but i dont know what it is, its not sun burn never seen it before

[DD.]

The nearest reported blight outbreak is still about 700 miles away from you, Zippy. I don't know what your weather is like down there, but it's too cool overnight here.

What's the stem look like? Perhaps the leaf looks like that as it's simply died, along with the whole plant. There seems to be a bit of blackleg around this year.

[Zippy]

Stems green. Whole plant floppy and watering does not revive it, though weeds in the pot are green and fresh.

I am relieved it isn't blight. Maybe it's just time to harvest this one, or maybe the compost has just petered out.

[dougsta]

Definitely not blight.

Could be Capsid bug (1/4 inch greenish critters) - if so look out for those small brown spots later turning into holes. Not a massive problem for yield though (so it says in my book).

Outside chance it could be Magnesium deficiency but that's usually more between the veins and more blotchy (not spotty). You could rule this out with a good liquid feed of something high in Mg.

[DD.]

Definitely not blight.

Could be Capsid bug (1/4 inch greenish critters) - if so look out for those small brown spots later turning into holes. Not a massive problem for yield though (so it says in my book).

Outside chance it could be Magnesium deficiency but that's usually more between the veins and more blotchy (not spotty). You could rule this out with a good liquid feed of something high in Mg.

dougsta - you seem to have missed the point that the plant has flopped ansd seems to be dying. That is a problem for yield and seems more than magnesium deficiency!

[Jay The Digger]

It looks more like some sort of bacterial leaf spot.  Although the leaves are very yellow suggesting either a lack of light or a deficiency.  If its the whole plant, it may be that the main stem has become damaged and isnt taking up nutirients properly.  The black spots maybe a secondary problem.

Pick off affected leaves and burn them.  Give them a good liquid feed and try to avoid getting the foliage wet.  Try and have a look at the stem down to the seed to make sure it's intact.

Hope this helps.

[DavidT]

It could be potato cyst eelworm.

[Zippy]

I don't know about the leaf spots but i opted to turn the planter out tonight anf harvested these so it wasn't eel worm as the potatoes were all smooth and clean - enough for a meal of four I would say; good for a small planter.

I guess the plant had just reached its time for harvesting and flopped. Not a lack of water as you can see from the weeds in the planter which are dark green and growing well!

[JayG]

They look good Zippy, what a relief!

Should point out though that the eelworm cysts mainly affect the roots rather than the tubers, although the tubers can also be affected in very bad cases (although they would also be very small and few in number which yours obviously aren't!)