[HHH]

"Gardeners and ‘allotment amateurs’ have been accused of fuelling a national potato shortage by spreading a devastating fungal blight."

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2218187/Amateur-gardeners-accused-fuelling-national-potato-shortage-spreading-dangerous-fungal-blight.html#ixzz29RnydEbE

What do users of this board think about this article, and particularly what the Chairman of the Potato Council is alleged to have said?

[Aunt Sally]

It's not the whole picture but I think it is true to a some degree.

On our allotment site we were hit by blight in July.  The first time we have had blight in very many years.  Some of the older members knew what to look for and removed the haulms as soon as they spotted it.  BUT many other members ignored the signs or may not have seen them at all until the plants died, whether from ignorance or because they don't visit their plots frequently enough.  Their potato crops will have produced a huge number of spores that will have wafted for miles.  I had even put out blight information and produced a fact sheet with pictures on early and late blight.

In past years we could spray with dithane and this would help to prevent blight and so reduce the sources of infection from allotments and gardens but now there is very little we can do other than remove the foliage at first sight of blight. 

Farmers must take most of the blame.  It only requires one farmer in an area not to control his outgrade pile (why do they have these?), by keeping it covered and sprayed with herbicide, to create the start of an outbreak.

Kent farmers don't grow many potatoes but in parts of the country were they do allotment holders who don't control their blight are contributing to the problem.

I'm now a scout for potato blight and will take a much more proactive part in it's control on our allotments from now on.

[Christine]

The fact that farmers spray and gardeners don't is often because the chemicals available to the amateur gardener are not as effective. This is because so many chemicals have been banned for amateur and unlicensed use in recent years.

Farmers use what it takes because it is their living (within cost effectiveness and reason) - gardeners who have a crop failure go down the shop and buy farm produce or go without. Usually amateur gardeners are not relying on their garden or allotment as part of their income.

Referring back to the Irish potato famine is not productive as both growing practice and knowledge have improved vastly since then. But what does your average non-grower understand of these matters? So many people are not involved in growing food or far removed from growing space that it is a nice scary headline to frighten the readers.

Me cynical? Third generation gardener and having grown up on farms - yes of course when it comes to the media.

[surbie100]

I think blaming allotment gardeners for a 61% rise in potato costs is a bit rich. While some plot holders do ignore blight, many don't. It's an impossible statement to prove. The numerous threads on here this season document the concern about the fungus and the frustration we've had this year in trying to get in contact with Gary at BlightWatch to submit potential blight samples.

The Today programme, Daily Mail, Metro, Telegraph have all run this story without question and without any input from NSALG or other voice from allotmenteers. Not particularly balanced journalism in my view.

[SG6]

Seems a bit rough on gardeners, they list 4 reasons why blight has been bad this year then at the end say it is the gardeners fault.  

In the artical they say farmers douse fields with chemicals well farmers douse chickens and animals with antibiotics and that has led to highly resistant strains of virus or bacteria that manage to kill people. Wonder if they have ever thought that farmers are managing the same with blight as they have with antibiotics.  

[mumofstig]

In past years we could spray with dithane and this would help to prevent blight and so reduce the sources of infection from allotments and gardens but now there is very little we can do other than remove the foliage at first sight of blight. 

Although Dithane was banned you can use Bayer's replacement product Fruit and Vegetable Disease Control
 
http://www.bayergarden.co.uk/en/data/Products/f/Fruit-and-Vegetable-Disease-Control.aspx

[JayG]

Amateur potato growers must contribute something to the problem because it's largely a game of chance and the more spores released into the atmosphere the greater the likelihood of the disease spreading, and not all will know or even care how to minimise the spread when it strikes.

That's not the whole story of course (not that the Daily Mail showed any inclination to bore us with such details  ) - I can't believe there were thousands more amateur potato growers this year than last which was relatively blight-free; the wet weather was always going to make this year very problematic.

Last time I looked the arsenal of chemicals available to professional growers (only!) was impressive not to mention a bit scary, in which case surely far more of their crops were lost due to generally poor growing conditions and waterlogging rather than blight? 

[Daamoot]

I'm tempted to take a few photos of the 'blighted' potato fields around my area.  Funny thing is, they look far more flooded than anything else.

[gavinjconway]

My plot neighbour dug about 10 plants of his spud crop, decided they were a waste of time and left the halums and small spuds strewn about the bed... never cut any down or disposed of them at all.. Grrrr..

[mumofstig]

That's not the whole story of course (not that the Daily Mail showed any inclination to bore us with such details  )

Please stop knocking the Daily Mail it's getting a bit of an irritation, because some of us do read it -

Funnily enough the Telegraph tells the same story - probably because they used the same source  
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/gardening/9609742/Gardeners-blamed-for-spreading-potato-blight.html

[HHH]

Odd that Mr Stevenson of the Potato Council (quoted in today's reports by various nespapers) has changed his rationale considerably in the last few weeks. This below from the PC's site dated 25 September under the heading "2012 - a watershed year for the potato industry):


“The combination of low yielding potato crops, increased crop spraying costs and increased wastage from problems such as greening, soft rots and growth cracks has massively increased the average cost of producing a tonne of potatoes in 2012 to over Ł200 per tonne. ...........There is no sense in making a terrible situation worse than it needs to be in the British potato industry by holding down prices artificially” says Allan Stevenson, Chairman of the Potato Council."

http://www.potato.org.uk/news/2012-watershed-year-potato-industry

No mention there of blight spread by "amateur growers".
 
T

[Kleftiwallah]

I agree 100% with Christine. 

Cheers,    Tony.

[hamstergbert]

I wonder if the wild deadly nightshade or the other wild native Solanaceae (and spuds and toms are of course also Solanaceae) are affected by blight - and also act as blight spore reservoirs?

Just sayin'....

[Aunt Sally]

In past years we could spray with dithane and this would help to prevent blight and so reduce the sources of infection from allotments and gardens but now there is very little we can do other than remove the foliage at first sight of blight. 

Although Dithane was banned you can use Bayer's replacement product Fruit and Vegetable Disease Control
 
http://www.bayergarden.co.uk/en/data/Products/f/Fruit-and-Vegetable-Disease-Control.aspx

That's very similar to Bordeaux Mixture (copper sulphate and Lime).  Fruit-and-Vegetable-Disease-Control contains Copper oxychloride and Kaolin.

[Rampant_Weasel]

this is precisely why the daily mail is a laughing stock to most sane ppl 

i assume those of us that grew sarpo are exempt from blame?

what about the big outgrade piles that allow the spores to overwinter in the first place? they need to practice good housekeeping themselves as well as we do.

if the industry had bred some more resistant varieties they wouldnt have this problem so much, it seems all fruit and veg has got more not less susceptible to disease over the years so sprays nearly have to be used.