Blue Belle x Lumper TPS

[jayb]

This is another cross I made a couple of years ago,using two potato varieties I like very much, but for different reasons Blue Belle and Lumper.
Blue Belle, a lovely good all round general purpose potato, very pretty to look at with gorgeous markings. Lumper - well it's lumpy and has a devastating part in history. Perhaps as well, a lasting reminder not to put all your faith in one or few varieties and their limited gene pool. I also made the cross Sarpo Mira x Lumper and have a few seeds to sow maybe next year.

I planted, I think 5 saved mini tubers this year, though sadly I may have to cut the haulms shortly, due to Late Blight arriving. But I’m hoping as they have been flowering for a few weeks there will be something to harvest, otherwise it is back to restarting TPS for this cross next year. I’d love to see a lumpy type with blue coloured eyes! The plants have grown well and are not too tall. Some of the plants have some dark shades on the stems and leaves, which indicates some colouring on the tubers. Flowers are in varying shades of purple-lilac.

[jayb]

Pretty flowers, no sign of seed pods forming, perhaps these needed a helping hand with pollination.

[jayb]

I didn't get around to hand pollinating the flowers, no berries set at all and I finally cut most of the haulms yesterday, as Late Blight is romping through the plot again. I've left a few plants as although they have a lot of black patches on their leaves it doesn't appear typical of L blight and no sign of spores being produced on the underside of leaves. Hopefully there will be a crop of some sort to harvest in a few weeks time.

[jayb]

I had a little scratch about and picked a couple of these to sample at the weekend, not really lumpy but a beautiful purple skin colour? Taste was lovely!

[jayb]

I picked these a couple of days ago, some plants withstood blight better than others which has influenced crop size. I didn't find any really lumpy types but 'Pink Belle' produced a big crop of decent sized potatoes with very good taste. Lovely size for bakers and one to keep.

The lovely purple coloured potatoes didn't cook so well, breaking up when boiled and when tasted alongside Pink Belle, just didn't make the cut. I mixed the plain looking tuber up with another so will taste again.

Mixed and washed

Blue Belle x Lumper potato by jayb 35, on Flickr

Purple
Blue Belle x Lumper potato by jayb 35, on Flickr

Pink Belle
Blue Belle x Lumper potato by jayb 35, on Flickr


White
Blue Belle x Lumper potato by jayb 35, on Flickr

[jayb]

Two from last year, the white is still in the ground.

[Galina]

You are brave to take on Lumper - it must have the worst reputation for blight resistance of any potato! Pink Belle is interesting, whereas Blue Belle has colouring in the eyes, this one has colouring anywhere *but* the eyes! Nice potatoes.

[jayb]

Perhaps a bit of a risk, but after growing them I don't think any worse for LB than PFA is. I really wanted to grow them as I remember being upset at school when reading about them and their part in history
.
Interesting the lilac - purple one, colour most likely comes from Blue Belle as Lumper is white/cream? Reminds me of the purple ones I got from Blue Belle tps (and robert) this year.

[Galina]

That's interesting. So Lumper simply were unfortunately the ones around at the time of the first awful blight occurrences, rather than being the worst potato for blight resistance. We have come a long way and learned so much. Lumper *can* still be grown today, because we have learned to start early and deal with blight appropriately etc. Also we have learned that any mono culture is inherently problematic. And of course we have the luxury of a supermarket if all else fails.

Pink Belle is an attractive shape too. And with decent yield. Presumably that is part of the Lumper heritage. You are on to a winner there .

[jayb]

They are certainly not good for LB resistance, leaf or tuber. At the time they had been hailed as the wonder potato to grow and there were just so many acres put in at the expense of other varieties. When LB saw a chink in the defense the consequences were huge . I guess it was a catastrophic putting all your eggs in one basket.

Pink Belle have really quite long flat tubers, whereas Lumber are much more rounded, but the colour is pretty and they eat well. I'd like to find a good lumpy shaped one with deep coloured eyes. I'll put a few tps next year if I have space.

[jayb]

I've started a few more Blue Belle x Lumper tps, they are currently in the greenhouse. Some with pretty Blue Belle colour patterns would be lush! Some of the seedlings are looking promising so far.














I'm still growing Pink Belle 14 and have saved a couple of tubers to plant again this year.

[jayb]

I only ended up with mini tubers, but I like the selection so far, I've another couple still to rinse and add to these.






The two in the top hand left corner are my favourites to look at, they kind of remind me of moomins!

[Galina]

Do you rinse potatoes before storing? Or just before photographing? I never have (bone idle me), just brush any clods of earth off. Should I have and why should I have? I fear that washing them before storing might take off protective skin and potentially cause rots? But as I said above, probably just my idleness

[jayb]

Quite often, particularly with tps crops as you can't really see what you have otherwise. Plus there is so much Late Blight on the plot I like to look out for early signs of infected tubers and throw them out, it's too easy to miss if they have mud on. Not idle, it's just the way I do mine, I'm sure many would say there is no point or it's the wrong thing to do

[Galina]

Had to google what Moomins are Yes they are very pretty and I hope the shape and the colour distribution of the purple all in the top will continue. I love the plain salmon and the large cream with the purple splashes. Remind me of a crafts class at school when we made decorative splashes with a lightly loaded paintbrush and a tea strainer!

[jayb]

Yeah, I think it will fade out some on larger tubers, but purple on pink is a pretty combination. Oooh I must have missed out on the tea strainer paint splashing, but yes I can see exactly what you mean I might sample one of the plain salmon ones as there seem to be enough to try.

[Galina]

Guess our schools were many miles apart from each other with entirely different curriculum

[jayb]

Yes likely, I do remember doing tie dyeing though, mostly t-shirts I seem to remember!

[Galina]

Ooh nice! Yes that was very 'in' and so pretty too.