Spraying water on potatoes when its frosty.

jed

Member
Location
Shropshire
Worked on a tattie farm in the eighties where they grew first earlies they would quite often water if a frost was forecast.
can‘t remember how much they used to put on .
 

Kidds

Member
Horticulture
Too late for mine, frost got them last night. (only a big garden patch not acres of them)
Irrigation used extensively for frost protection in top fruit. Has to be a regular sprinkle though, not wet it and leave it. Seem to remember sprinkler has to rotate once every 3 minutes or more. (something like that)
 

willio

Member
Looking at another frost tonite round here and I’m gonna try ‘washing the frost off’ the spuds. Is it worth dropping anything else in, manganese or mag nite
 
Looking at another frost tonite round here and I’m gonna try ‘washing the frost off’ the spuds. Is it worth dropping anything else in, manganese or mag nite
Not sure at all but i suspect no.
The water thing on a frost / pre frost is all about Entropy, Heat of Fusion and so on.
When ice thaws 334 joules of energy needs to be adsorbed per 1 gram of ice...this energy is taken from the immediate surroundings including the leaf the ice is on.
In a marginal frost on a delicate leaf this heat of fusion energy draw is enough to damage a leaf that might otherwise be ok...that is why irrigating warmer water, usually ahead of sunrise, sometimes works very effectively.
 

willio

Member
Not sure at all but i suspect no.
The water thing on a frost / pre frost is all about Entropy, Heat of Fusion and so on.
When ice thaws 334 joules of energy needs to be adsorbed per 1 gram of ice...this energy is taken from the immediate surroundings including the leaf the ice is on.
In a marginal frost on a delicate leaf this heat of fusion energy draw is enough to damage a leaf that might otherwise be ok...that is why irrigating warmer water, usually ahead of sunrise, sometimes works very effectively.
We had an unexpected frost Monday nite and it’s done enough damage already, so anything is worth a try
 

Trying

Member
Ridging up today as two nights of frosts.already had a little tickle from previous frosts.
04F329EB-2E89-432D-B43C-69D96A77052B.jpeg
 

Cloonpotatoes

Member
Location
Donegal
I tried a field this morning. I will know better in the morning how effective it was, generally used about 500l/ha. on inspection it had made a good job of defrosting about half the plants. I used brown defy nozzles at over 4 bar pressure. I think lower pressure and a coarser spray pattern would have been more effective
 

legin

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
West Midlands
I tried a field this morning. I will know better in the morning how effective it was, generally used about 500l/ha. on inspection it had made a good job of defrosting about half the plants. I used brown defy nozzles at over 4 bar pressure. I think lower pressure and a coarser spray pattern would have been more effective
Did it help?
 

Lowland1

Member
Mixed Farmer
When you irrigate before a frost you get latent heat of crystallisation or so I was told when I worked in Florida. Christmas Eve 1989 a frost was forecasted and so sprinklers were put out on some of our bean fields whilst neighbours did the same on their tomatoes and squash. The tree farmers already had them set up. We went off to Miami as we were told it was snowing on the beach. It was but it hadn't settled. Came back at midnight turned the water on as the temperature dropped. Next morning the corps were covered with ice but for the beans it didn'twork well as I don't think they had sufficient foliage but for the bigger crops it helped a lot probably as the more ice the more heat.
 

Cloonpotatoes

Member
Location
Donegal
It seems to have helped a little. Depressing morning here. Sprayed field is top picture probably 60% frost damage. Lower pic unsprayed closer to 90% damage. Was planning to start irrigation next week. No need now [emoji22]
IMG_6501.JPG
IMG_6502.JPG
 

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Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

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As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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