A waste of time or a real benefit for the harvest - is it necessary to pick flowers from potatoes and when is the best time to do it?

Potato culture has an interesting feature: for procreation, two mechanisms are used simultaneously - propagation by seeds and tubers. The berries that have set with a large number of seeds are of no value to the average summer resident. Moreover, they are considered poisonous and try to avoid contact with them.

Traditionally, a vegetative method is used to grow potato crops: tubers are planted whole or in parts. Approximately 1 month after the emergence of seedlings, the most important period in the development of the plant begins - flowering.

Phases and time of potato bush development

Under favorable weather conditions, the first shoots appear approximately 1 week after planting in the ground. From this moment, intensive growth of the bush begins: its above-ground and underground parts. After about a month, the potato bush throws out inflorescences:

• early ripening varieties - after 27-36 days;
• late ripening period - 46-48 days.

The formation of tubers on underground stems (stolons) begins much earlier. By the time the flowers appear, some reach the size of a chicken egg, the rest are no larger than a pea. Their growth requires a huge amount of nutritious juices; the bush has to distribute its energy between the growing underground tubers and the above-ground inflorescence with the resulting seeds.

A parallel process occurs: seeds develop in the berries at the top of the potato bush and underground modified stems, which we call tubers. Logic dictates: if you remove one of these “consumers” of the bush’s energy (the berry cluster), the increased outflow of nutrients will give a significant increase in the underground yield.

Scientists agronomists conducted numerous studies and came to the conclusion:

• 50% of nutritious juices are spent on the formation of tubers;
• 25% goes into the leaves;
• 25% goes to inflorescences.

The secret of a big harvest is flowering

If the plant was grown in accordance with all norms and requirements, then flowering will be painless for the root crop. A crop that doesn’t need nutrients will never produce bad fruit, and flowers certainly won’t be able to interfere with anything in this case. It’s better to just help your root crop survive this budding stage. And then your harvest will be large and healthy. If budding cannot bring any threat to the future harvest, then why bother the plant and add extra work to yourself.

Potatoes delight themselves with flowers, so you can rejoice with them. There will be no less fruit from this. Another thing is the tomato. If you trim the branches and stepsons of a tomato, the flowering will be more intense and the fruiting will be greater. This happens because the crop is afraid that it will be ruined in this way and begins to form more fruits in order to leave a kind of offspring along with the seeds. However, this method works well with fruits rather than roots. This method of intimidation will not work for potatoes.

Are potato flowers needed or not - the experience of agronomists

Flowers are not needed at all for the formation of underground tubers, so why not remove them at the bud stage. To further clarify the issue, an experiment was conducted:

1. The potato plot was divided into 2 parts.
2. In plot No. 1, all flowers at the bud formation stage were removed.
3. The yield of potato tubers collected from plot No. 1 was 30% greater than from control plot No. 2, where the flowers were not removed and berries with seeds were produced.

A very simple way to increase potato yields is actually not so clearly good.

The degeneration of a variety is manifested in the degradation of varietal characteristics - yield, tuber size, taste, etc. The exclusively vegetative method of propagation leads to an avalanche-like accumulation of genetic problems, which cross-pollination helps to avoid under natural conditions.

When to pick flowers

The period of removal of inflorescences is considered important from the point of view of yield for the plant.

Farmers noticed the following fact. If you remove buds from a potato, the plant tends to quickly restore them, actively growing new ones in an effort to set seeds . It spends a significant amount of nutrition and energy on this process to the detriment of the formation of stolons and the increase in the size of tubers.

Remove flower stalks only when the flowers on them have already bloomed. Potatoes, like tomatoes, are self-pollinating plants. When the pollination process has passed and ovaries begin to form, the plant receives a hormonal signal about this. It stops wasting energy on budding and completely switches to vegetative propagation.

How to pick potato flowers - simple rules

Removing flowers from a potato bush is carried out with extreme caution in order to minimize harm to the plant. This simple operation is carried out either at the very beginning of the appearance of the flower cluster, or after the formation of the ovary. After flowering, the set berries are cut off with a sharp knife or scissors.

Attention: cutting off blooming flowers is not recommended. This weakens the plant's immunity. Flowers cut from potatoes at the wrong time can provoke an unexpected outbreak of a viral or fungal infection.

What happens if you pick off the flowers of a potato during flowering?

Nutrients during the potato growing season are distributed as follows:

• for tubers – 45%;
• for stems and tops – 25%;
• for buds and flowers – 25%.

Logically speaking, it seems that if flowers and buds are trimmed, the amount of nutrients entering the tubers will increase. Professional figures have repeatedly found out whether this is so. Three beds of potatoes were planted. On the first one, no changes were made. On the second, the tops were pinched. We tried to cut off all the buds and flowers from the bushes of the third ridge. After harvesting, the results were distributed as follows:

1. From the first bed we collected fewer tubers, but large ones with a clear shape.
2. In the second bed, the harvest was larger, but the size of the vegetables was small. And only a few large specimens. Results on the third bed?

See also Features, advantages and disadvantages of growing potatoes in bags

Important. When flowers, buds are removed and the tops are pinched, the number of fruits increases, but their quality decreases.

Practical recommendations

Almost 100% of potatoes in household plots are grown to obtain tubers for food for themselves and animals. Most summer residents try to update planting material more often; they buy seed potatoes in stores from breeding stations and simply at the market.

You can save significant money (and even earn money) if you try to grow seed microtubers: make good use of the berries that grow on potato bushes. To do this, it is quite enough to leave a few bushes with flowers, wait for the berries to ripen and cut them for seeds.

Potato bushes grown through seedlings from seeds are characterized by high productivity for at least 4-5 years, resistance to diseases and weather conditions. Such planting material is classified as “super elite”

To increase the yield of tubers in the main area of ​​the potato bed, it is advisable to remove the buds before flowering begins. A simple agricultural technique can result in a yield increase of up to 30%.

From the video you can find out why it is definitely necessary to pick flowers from potatoes.

Gardening tips

Before deciding whether to pick potato flowers, you should consider a few basic recommendations:

• Firstly, special attention should be paid to the climatic conditions in which the plant develops. It is believed that in areas with arid and windy climates, most flowers are sterile. In other words, seed formation does not occur at the end of the potato growing season. No energy is wasted on maturation. Thus, injuring the plant in such a case would be an unjustified risk.
• Secondly, do not forget about the safety of the plant and quarantine measures. Picking off potato flowers, a man walks between the rows. This causes trampling of the soil. Due to the large size of the bushes, hilling the beds is impossible. Hard rocks inhibit the development of tubers, which will affect potato yields.
• Thirdly, humans are carriers of fungal and bacterial diseases. By removing inflorescences, fungal pathogens, viruses and bacteria spread from bush to bush. Ultimately, this can cause crop failure.

If the decision about whether to pick off the flowers of the potatoes was positive, then you should remember that this process should be carried out before the buds gain color. If time is lost, the inflorescences must be left until the seeds ripen.

Potato flowering and rules of agricultural technology

Compliance with agricultural technology for growing potatoes guarantees success even for an inexperienced summer resident. Particular attention should be paid to potato beds during the flowering period.

It is important to remember that simultaneously with the buds, stolons are formed in the underground part of the bush, on which the tubers are poured. The soil should be loose so as not to create obstacles for stolons.

That is why during flowering you should not loosen or hill up - so as not to damage the root shoots.

Flower removal technique

If you decide to pick off the flowers, you need to monitor the formation of buds in order to carry out the procedure on time. It is allowed to cut off the inflorescences at the budding stage until they open. If the procedure is carried out later, the likelihood of the lower leaves drying out increases. This leads to a decrease in yield. Before you remove the flowers, you need to prepare for the growing season to be extended by 2 weeks. The plant needs this time to recover.

Buds should be torn off in accordance with the following recommendations:

1. The procedure is performed at moderate air temperatures. Do not break off flower brushes during rain or heat.
2. The work is carried out with sharp, pre-disinfected instruments to reduce the likelihood of the spread of diseases.
3. When moving between rows, they walk carefully so as not to trample the soil and damage the leaves.
4. Be sure to cut off the flower clusters that rise above the total mass of the bush, then there will be no strong growth with the formation of a large number of side shoots.

What should you do before flowering starts?

Even before the buds begin to appear, in order to get a good harvest, it is necessary to prepare loose, moisture-rich soil, carry out high-quality watering, loosening the rows and hilling the potato bushes.

Hilling potatoes during flowering leads to a significant reduction in yield.

Adherents of classical methods of growing potatoes are skeptical about everything unusual. Why remove flowers on bushes if fertilizers, watering and weeding guarantee a high harvest.

No one denies centuries of farming experience. To verify the effectiveness of the method, it is enough to conduct an experiment on your own plot: remove the flowers and compare the yield.

Compliance with the rules of agricultural technology, combined with a deep understanding of biological processes, will ensure a significant increase in yield of up to 30%.

Advantages and disadvantages of removal

Whether to remove flowers and buds depends on the decision of the gardener. But before the procedure, you should once again weigh the positive and negative sides of this action, read scientific literature, and listen to the advice of competent gardeners.

The potato growing season has several phases. If one of them (flowering) is missed, and even forcibly, one can hardly expect a good harvest.

Disadvantages of removing flowers:

1. Damage to the crop when pruning inflorescences leads to an increase in the ripening time of tubers. The plant needs enormous strength to restore injured shoots. Having lost flowers (buds), the crop will supply nutrients for the formation of new inflorescences, and the growth of tubers will be delayed indefinitely.
2. Due to the cutting off of flowers, the potato variety degenerates. Productivity drops, fruits become smaller.
3. The crop does not receive enough air due to compaction of the soil between the rows, since constant walking between rows is required to carry out the procedure. This will lead to a drop in yield.
4. Pruning negatively affects the health of the crop, weakens the immune system, and reduces resistance to infections. Potatoes with cut inflorescences are more prone to diseases, even the most dangerous of them - late blight.

During the normal course of flowering, a smaller amount of nutrients is consumed by the tubers. At the same time, the amount of starch in potatoes decreases. Although for many this does not matter.

But it will be better for potatoes if people do not interfere with the natural development of the crop. Then the plant will get sick less, produce a good harvest and delight with good-quality seed material.

Important. If the soil for potatoes is poor and dense, it is recommended to trim flowers and buds so that more nutrients reach the tubers.

Don't confuse flowers and buds

• By cutting off flowers, you save the plant from having to waste energy on the development of essentially unnecessary parts.

• By picking buds, you, on the contrary, aggravate the situation, since the culture begins to spend even more energy growing new buds instead of the ones that were picked.

Back Next

Why gardeners are against removing flowers

Not all gardeners answer positively when asked whether the apple tree has bloomed for the first time or whether the flowers need to be picked off. There is also an opposite opinion on this matter. A large number of summer residents are against such interference in natural processes. It is also believed that the fruit crop is able to independently get rid of excess ovary. The tree will only have the amount of fruit it can grow in the coming season.

Gardeners are against removing flowers

People who express this opinion are convinced that by artificially controlling the number of flowers, a small harvest can also be obtained. There are several reasons for this:

• a large number of barren flowers;
• late frosts;
• strong wind or spring hail.

No one is immune from such vagaries of nature. If you first pick off the extra flowers and then encounter force majeure circumstances, you may be left without apples altogether. On the territory of Russia, only, probably, in the southern regions in the spring, when the gardens are blooming, is stable weather established. In other areas, especially in the central part, late spring frosts, heavy winds and precipitation in the form of hail are not uncommon.

It is not uncommon for barren flowers to form on the tree. Most often, their abundant appearance indicates insufficient care. Empty flowers can be a result of lack of feeding and pruning. If you take full care of your garden throughout the year, there will be a lot of ovaries.

On a note. Another significant argument against artificial flower removal will be the difficulty of carrying out this process on perennial trees. Some people recommend simply removing one of the skeletal branches, which will also help increase the quality of the harvest.

Since ancient times, the apple tree has been a garden crop that is associated with beauty, health, and harmony. Despite the primitive structure of flowers, they produce tasty fruits, and they themselves contain a lot of useful components and substances. But when growing apple trees in your garden, it is worth remembering that unkempt trees are beautiful only in nature. In your own garden, it is important to monitor the condition of the plants, trim them, water them and feed them. With this care, the plant will respond with a good harvest. When the apple tree begins to bloom for the first time, it is up to everyone to decide whether to pick the flowers or not. But still, as practice shows, in the first year, removing inflorescences is justified and is a necessary measure.

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