Everything's gone yellow!

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Everything's gone yellow!

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Fee

Joined: 21 Mar 2005
Posts: 15922
Location: Earth

Posted: Fri Jul 06, 07 8:30 am Post subject: Everything's gone yellow!

Just been down to our allotment, and everything's looking very yellow down there

There's an entire row of potatoes that have gone all yellow, and some of my beans have a yellow tinge to the leaves. And a lot of my onions are looking yellowy too.

What's the problem? Is it a lack of nitrogen?

Our plot isn't the only one looking a bit yellow after the rains of the past few weeks either. The only plots which look nice and green are those looked after by people who pile all sorts of chemicals on them at every opportunity.

What do I do?

cab

Joined: 01 Nov 2004
Posts: 32429

Posted: Fri Jul 06, 07 9:08 am Post subject:

Spuds: Are they earlies or main crop?

Beans: Old leaves or new leaves?

Whats the soil like, acid, basic, sandy, full of organic content, etc?

Does sound like a specific nutrient problem, probably brought about by all this rain. The best bet is always to get some good organic content into the soil before planting, but your problem now shouldn't be impossible to solve. We just need to work out a few details.

Fee

Joined: 21 Mar 2005
Posts: 15922
Location: Earth

Posted: Fri Jul 06, 07 9:15 am Post subject:
Spuds: Earlies are yellow, main crop are fine. Beans: Not sure actually, will chekc when I go back down this afternoon. The soil is sandy, parts have plenty of organic content, like the beans, the spuds area hasn't had anything extra put in by us for the past year. We're planning on getting a truck of manure to dump on it in the autumn, which we meant to do last year!

cab

Joined: 01 Nov 2004
Posts: 32429

Posted: Fri Jul 06, 07 10:05 am Post subject:

Fee wrote:

Spuds: Earlies are yellow, main crop are fine.

They're just telling you that they're plenty past ready to come out. Don't worry over it, cut the tops (the haulm) off and harvest when you have time.

Quote:

Beans: Not sure actually, will chekc when I go back down this afternoon.

The soil is sandy, parts have plenty of organic content, like the beans, the spuds area hasn't had anything extra put in by us for the past year.

We're planning on getting a truck of manure to dump on it in the autumn, which we meant to do last year!

Cool, let us know how the beans are; if its the older leaves yellowing then a sparse scattering of blood fish and bone and watering with a will probably do the job, watered in with some urine watered down in a can. If its the younger ones then I'd water in a liquid feed and then mulch with muck or compost.

Oh, when did the onions go in? They're about ready to harvest on my plot, yours might be dying off ready to come out.

alisjs

Joined: 23 Jun 2006
Posts: 1497
Location: Conwy

Posted: Fri Jul 06, 07 10:09 am Post subject:
I had a similar problem and someone suggested magnesium defficiency......added epsom salts and stuff did green up

bingo

Joined: 26 Oct 2006
Posts: 4401
Location: The Games Room normally!

Posted: Fri Jul 06, 07 10:10 am Post subject:
My Maris Pipers have gone yellow so we started eating them. Will he rest be O.K. in the ground untill I'm ready to eat them?

cab

Joined: 01 Nov 2004
Posts: 32429

Posted: Fri Jul 06, 07 10:15 am Post subject:

alisjs wrote:

I had a similar problem and someone suggested magnesium defficiency......added epsom salts and stuff did green up

Careful with that. Magnesium deficiency is typified by yellowing in the older leaves, whats happening is that the plants are stripping magnesium out of the chlorophyll in the older leaves, so they go yellow, and putting it into the younger leaves. So yes, espom salts will solve that, but they're VERY soluble. So what can happen is you scatter some down or dissolve and pour it on, and it then rains and washes out. Or, worse, by making the water around the roots really rather concentrated with salts, you can end up getting a sort of burning effect on the roots. So be sparing if you're going for directly salting with something like emspom salts.

cab

Joined: 01 Nov 2004
Posts: 32429

Posted: Fri Jul 06, 07 10:15 am Post subject:

bingo wrote:

My Maris Pipers have gone yellow so we started eating them. Will he rest be O.K. in the ground untill I'm ready to eat them?

I'd have thought so, but if the haulm goes any worse than yellow (starts dying back) then cut it off.

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45690
Location: Essex

Posted: Fri Jul 06, 07 10:23 am Post subject:
Sounds to me like harvest time on the spuds, onions. How old are the beans, they might be getting ready to quit too.

alisjs

Joined: 23 Jun 2006
Posts: 1497
Location: Conwy

Posted: Fri Jul 06, 07 10:39 am Post subject:
I measured the epsom salts and added as solution.....beans were my problem too.....but this was a few weeks back. Beans greened up and are now in flower

happytechie

Joined: 24 Jan 2006
Posts: 408
Location: Surrey (at the mo.)

Posted: Tue Jul 10, 07 8:27 pm Post subject:
it's all good the beans have kind of recovered after a dressing of chicken manure pellets and the spuds (charlotte and orla) are now out and being eaten, very tasty they are too we need to source a few tons of poo to goon there in the autumn though. I can collect if anyone's got a big pile and some bags I can borrow ? Paul (Fee's OH)

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45690
Location: Essex

Posted: Wed Jul 11, 07 10:47 am Post subject:
Any mushroom farms near you? Check www.yell.com for mushroom growers.

Fee

Joined: 21 Mar 2005
Posts: 15922
Location: Earth

Posted: Wed Jul 11, 07 12:09 pm Post subject:
Yeah, there are actually, just down in Egham where we get the car serviced.

oldish chris

Joined: 14 Jun 2006
Posts: 4148
Location: Comfortably Wet Southport

Posted: Thu Jul 12, 07 8:00 pm Post subject:
I have found that "half hardy", i.e. sub-tropical, plants have yellowy leaves when they are feeling cold. My courgettes have gone from yellow with a few green spots to (new leaves) bright green and back again (most recent leaves). Unless growing conditions are good, I wouldn't worry about mineral deficiencies (personally).

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