Camote selection NZ

[Richard Watson]

The 2023-24 summer growing season was a terrible period for not only my camote plants because they got hit by a surprise late spring frost, which did hit so many other gardeners locally also. They did came away again but took the summer to get big enough to flower, by then though it was starting to cool down, so no seed set this year. Ive got them all as cuttings now and will try again come spring. The good news is the first of my seedlings are good flower producing cultivars. ... so roll on spring.

[reed]

How about the roots? Did they make some of any size?

[Richard Watson]

Small roots. Just wasnt there summer for doing well.

[Richard Watson]

Now mid winter and I'm really pleased with the cutting plants flowering, they are flowering as well as what they would during summer. Once they do go outside again they tend to stop flower till the proper warmth of summer kicks in.

[reed]

You can even get seeds that way, just need to hand pollinate them. It's easy to test for self-compatibility too. They sometimes will also grow little storage roots that can be used to propagate more plants in the spring. Just cut off the tops to clone and let the little storage roots dry up a little bit, but not much, and replant them.

Rootless cuttings produce new roots to harvest better than planting an old root or a well rooted potted plant. An old root will just start growing again instead of making nice fresh new ones. It ends up big and ugly with feeder roots and stems sticking out all over it. A well rooted plant tends to make lots of small storage roots instead of a few nice big ones.

[Richard Watson]

That's good to know, I'm not worried to much at this stage about the roots, more seed really.

[Richard Watson]

Update on this growing season so far.
I think I am seeing some degree of adaption in the first of my own seed plants. Past generations the wintered plants during the coldest period of winter would take place inside the house as the unheated greenhouse was not quite warm enough to keep them alive, these plants would flower all winter in the house and also from August in the greenhouse once it warmed enough. Come November when planted outside they stopped producing flowers for a month or so, then start again. This spring though the wintered over plants did not stop flowering even after a few nights of around zero to 1 deg C. So now looking forward to summer and more seed production.   

[reed]

I harvested mine back about middle of September and just pitched the vines on the ground where they rooted down and resumed growing. A couple nights with light frost didn't bother them too much and I'm still collecting a seed here and there, but they have stopped blooming. We are supposed to hit zero C and below soon and close too it during the day. I imagine that will be the end of them.

[Richard Watson]

An update on the 2024-25 summer growing season.

My seedlings grew well and produced lots of flowers which they did all through winter inside but only stopped briefly after being planted outside. The summer turned out to be a continuation of the cooler summers of the last 10 years, this summer even more so, only two day days with temps over 30degC. Had heaps of bubblebees but have picked no seed, there are seed pods out there but are not growing now that the nights are getting colder. So plans are to take them as cuttings today and see if they can mature inside where its warmer.
Mark do you have any tips as to how best I go about this.

[reed]

Your idea to take cuttings inside should probably work, just remember takes longer than you might expect for them to mature.

They are probably fine outside too so long as you aren't risking actual freeze. That applies only if it is dry. A little rain, heavy morning dew, cloudy, mixed with cool weather can rot them.

[Richard Watson]

Ive taken 12-13 or so, found one pod that is not too far off. The nights are getting cold and so they were not fulling out, had two very light frosts so far which is way to early. If only we could get back to the summers of 20+ years ago when we used to get heat waves, they would have grown better then.

Im going to find gardener in the North Island who will take cuttings, winter over and get seed at the end of this year, should help acclimatize to not only to growing here in the southern hemisphere but also our maritime climate....hopefully.

[reed]

If you're having frost, it's definitely time to get them in. Our weather has done a bit a flip too. Almost the middle of March and I haven't done much of anything in the garden. I'd gotten used to having some planting and most all prep work done by now, last year my barley was well established at end of February.  We had actual snow this year at first of January and it stayed on the ground for a month. Then more snow, more freezing until just the last few days.

Was 22 degC yesterday and starting to dry out. My house plant sweet potatoes enjoyed the day outside. Calling for sun the next several days and up to 35 degC by Friday. I'm worried that it's about to get hot and dry, fast.