Where can I buy TPS?
 

I have searched the internet, but can not find a place where a hobby gardener could buy true potato seeds.
I am interested mainly in the colorful blue, purple and red varieties and also different type of fingerlings.

Why am I looking for TPS? I could save the seeds long time and I would also be able to send them to my parents overseas without risking of spreading some potato diseases.

Svalli,

I am not surprised that you have searched the internet, but could not find a place where a hobby gardener could buy true potato seeds! I have thought about re-starting my Tater-Mater Seed Catalog and listing TPS (true potato seed) again. You are right, there are precious few sites that even go into TPS issues.

You say you are interested mainly in the colorful blue, purple and red varieties and also different type of fingerlings. Those are among the types of potatoes I would like to introduce as TPS in the future. I have about the biggest collection of specialty hybrids and OP's in TPS as anybody around.

The reason you are looking for ([i]TPS[/i]) is that you could save the seeds long time and would also be able to send them to your parents overseas (Finland?) without risking of spreading some potato diseases. Yes, potato seed, again known as TPS, can be saved for many years. I grew plants from seed of 1959 last year. True potato seed carries virtually no virus, except there are some import/export issues that are problematic in some countries besides the USA.

Starting from true seed in potatoes is a wonderful way of initiating new potential varieties free of disease. One can usually grow them a season or so without much trouble. Latent season infection may not manifest itself the first year or two, but as time goes on there seems to be aphids that will carry in a problem or two. Soil infestations of fungal and bacteria can start problems on new clones, but this is where breeding for resistances/tolerances come in handy.

In my breeding work, I try to select for tuber lines that can be grown for many generations without any decrease of yield, etc., even in the presence of oodles of bad guys.

Tom Wagner

potato seed
 

Check out [url]www.woodprairie.com[/url]
They sell organic potatoes for seed. You should find the varieties you are looking for.

Svalli, the only place that I've ever come upon that sells TPS is Territorial Seed, which apparently sells seeds only for this variety:

[url]http://www.territorial-seed.com/stores/1/Potato_Seed_C619.cfm[/url]

Catalina and a few other TPS lines are OK, but if you are looking for potatoes Svalli wants, (blues, purples, reds, and fingerlings) you have a problem.

I grew a number of seedlings from the Catalina family and they were fine, but somewhat boring.

Tom Wagner

Woodprairie farm sells fingerlings, blues, purples etc.

soil_lover says in quote:

[quote]Check out [url]www.woodprairie.com[/url]
They sell organic potatoes for seed. You should find the varieties you are looking for. Woodprairie farm sells fingerlings, blues, purples etc.
[/quote]

Soil_Lover,

Referring to Wood Prairie or other companies is not going to answer Svalli's wishes. It doesn't matter that they may have fingerlings, blues, purples. Those are available not as TPS but as tubers. They may be seed potatoes but they certainly are not true potato seeds. That is what Svalli wants..TPS ...not tubers. And as I said in an earlier post, Territorial Seeds does not have TPS in the types Svalli wants. If you read Svalli's post, it will be obvious TPS is wanted, not tubers. I am almost positive that Svalli does not want to send tubers in an envelope!

Since confusion about TPS and potato seed in general will never ever be clear to the public, I must offer some quick primers below:

True Potato Seed (TPS)

Botanical seed produced by potatoes

Seed balls resembling tomatoes

TPS is in the berry after the potato has finished flowering

Potatoes are usually planted from seed potatoes, potato seed = tuber not TPS

Tubers may habor diseases, virus, bacteria wilt, blight, fungi, etc.

TPS is free of diseases, exceptions 2 viruses, but those are rare



TPS seedlings are different from the parent plant(s) and from each other

TPS plants are mostly inferior to the parental stock, but occasionally better

TPS is the source of genetic diversity

TPS is saved similar to that used to save tomato seeds

When the seed balls (berries) (fruit) are still green, but soft to the touch, seed extracted

TPS is sown like tomato seed, but slightly shallower

TPS seedlings are transplanted once in the greenhouse to bury cotyledons and one or more true leaves

Transplanted seedlings grown this way will soon be transplanted to field, covering up a few more leaves

Harvest of TPS can be single hill selected, or bulked depending on objectives

Tom Wagner BTW, my work with potatoes is to convert as many potato varieties into True Potato Seed (TPS) as humanly possible. This is accomplished through hybridization, selfing, and open pollination strategies. Many varieties are simply not cooperative in this effort, however.

Thanks Tom,

You are absolutely correct in what I am looking for. If I wanted just to experiment with growing potatoes from the true seeds, I could buy the Catalina seeds, but as you mentined I am not looking for any "boring" varieties.

You are doing absolutely wonderful work by breeding and saving the potato varieties. I grew up eating potatoes like my family has been doing generations and nobody really ever realized how facinating plants they really are and how many different varieties there can be. I now find growing different varieties of potatoes as interesting as growing the tomatoes and peppers. I have purchased, traded, collected and saved seeds many types of peppers and tomatoes, and I would like to do the same with potatoes.

I wish I would have known to save the true seeds from my grandfather's field of the fingerling potatoes he always grew. I remeber seeing a lot of berries on the vines. The seed stock of the tubers got some kind of blight, so my my father finally stopped growing them.

If you start selling the TPS, let me know. I would be one of your first customers.

BR,
Sari

[quote]Tom Wagner BTW, my work with potatoes is to convert as many potato varieties into True Potato Seed (TPS) as humanly possible. This is accomplished through hybridization, selfing, and open pollination strategies. Many varieties are simply not cooperative in this effort, however.[/quote]

Tom, can you off the poor guy some seed then?

Svalli,

Thanks for clarifying that my clarification is finally clarified; may we all see [i]clarly[/i] now!(':oops:')

As a moderator of the Potato Forum, I don't want to be guilty of [b]overtly commercial postings[/b] as I could be swished as surely as one steps on a [i]Monomorium minimum[/i]. I am trying to post my work as general information not as one would expect from a shoddy shyster.

Discussions are underway with a few previews of [i]bubbles[/i] linking my Tater-Mater Seeds to potatoes, both tuber and TPS.

Tom Wagner