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I have just come back from holiday and of course my little veg plot is a mess !! On looking at my potatoes , earlies, I have found these unusual little green "fruit" growing from some of the stems. They look like tiny green tomatoes and are very hard. Never seen this before,any idea what they are?

Potato seeds

+1.

This may help........http://www.ipm.iastate.edu/ipm/hortnews/2004/7-2-2004/tomatopotato.html

Thanks for that, never seen it before. The potato is an early, Maris Bard and I think two of the plants have acquired this fruit. Oh well better cut them off and bin them.
thxs again

You can save the seed and grow them next year just like you would tomato seeds, and because of weirdness of genetics, each plant you get like that will be a completely new variety!

I'm desperately hoping my potatoes will fruit so I can try this. I have Charlotte, Estima and Desiree. Fingers crossed for potato fruits...

Tom Wagner videos on true potato seed (TPS).

http://www.bifurcatedcarrots.eu/2009/11/tom-wagner-on-growing-and-saving-true-potato-seeds-tps/

I'd love to have berries on mine, but they're not producing any pollen!

Found a Desiree fruit earlier, yay! It's tiny so hopefully it'll stay on the plant long enough to get to a decent size.

Maris Bard and Desiree are both good producers of berries 

No need to remove them Fitzie unless you want to, although some thoughts are they take a little strength from forming tubers, I can't see how this is really the case or farmers would have worked out how to remove them. They are poisonous though if you have any young folk around that might take a fancy to them. If you haven't removed them try harvesting the pods later on and saving the seeds to grow your own variety next year. It's not difficult and lots of fun to watch them grow from tiny seedlings to producing plant, you can get some fantastic results 

Quote from: Silverleaf on July 06, 2014, 10:25:39
I'm desperately hoping my potatoes will fruit so I can try this. I have Charlotte, Estima and Desiree. Fingers crossed for potato fruits...

If you'd like to try some other varieties I've several you can try.

A couple of pictures of potato seed pods - berries - apples - tps they seem to go by several names.

Quote from: fitzsie on July 06, 2014, 08:54:57
Thanks for that, never seen it before. The potato is an early, Maris Bard and I think two of the plants have acquired this fruit. Oh well better cut them off and bin them.
thxs again

..........  unless you are the adventurous type  ................  let the potato fruits dry, save the seeds and grow your very own potato variety from seeds.  Start early, like tomatoes.  You will get smallish tubers in year one.  Full size tubers in year two,  virus free stock (until the new variety acquires virus over the next years in your garden). 

Results are always edible and you might have some spectacular plants amongst them.

This is what Jayb grew from TPS (true potato seeds):
http://www.allotments4all.co.uk/smf/index.php?topic=76652.0

I have some fruits on my volunteer desirees. I understand desirees are quite good at producing the fruit. I might actually try to save some and grow them. Never thought of doing it before!

It's worth an experiment, right?

And you might get an awesome new variety that way. Either way, it'll be interesting.

Had another look today and I've loads of fruit on my potatoes. I guess I've got to give it ago now and  try and collect the seeds !!

Yep 

I've watched the video and saw how he tried to collect the seeds   

Quote from: Silverleaf on July 06, 2014, 10:34:07
Tom Wagner videos on true potato seed (TPS).

http://www.bifurcatedcarrots.eu/2009/11/tom-wagner-on-growing-and-saving-true-potato-seeds-tps/

As I see it, the main task is to remove the glutinous substance around the seeds. I collected seeds last year from tomatoes, I removed the same substance by placing the seeds in a jar, adding some water, cover ( allowing some air to get in) and then allow the mould to grow. This breaks down the gel so when they are rinsed you only have the seeds left. I then dried the seeds and put them in an envelope, only to lose them over the winter !!!

Would this method work for the potato seeds ? ( without the losing them bit )

We have around 12 or 14 apples on our spuds this morning, so they are going to be looked after and we will see what happens next year.

fitzsie,  there isn't the same gel on potato seeds.  I have never fermented mine.  I just cut the fruit open and squash the contents between my fingers , which makes the seeds visible.  The skin is left behind.  Then I dry the seeds (and the little bit of other stuff that still sticks on then) on a plastic lid (from a big pot of yoghurt - that sort of thing).  Then scrape the dried matter off.   I suppose squashing it into a glass of water and stirring vigorously before sieving the seeds could work too.

The seeds are a bit smaller than tomatoes.

Another way might be to half the potato fruit and squeeze between thumb and forefinger.  The seeds will pop up and can be scraped onto the plastic lid with a little knife.  This is how I save tomatillo seeds.

The biggest problem is to know when the potato fruit is ripe.  They do get a bit soft and turn pale green/whitish when they are 'ripe',  but I have also taken them off still green when the potato haulm was being composted, put on a saucer and left to mature on the windowsill until the fruits were getting a bit soft to the touch.  And the seeds germinated fine.