Wednesday, December 16, 2015

Harvesting Oca

On Nov 10, 2015 I had some frost damage to the tops of the Oca. Yet there was still green growth on many parts of the stem. I asked and was told by William. On the 23 of November ."The above ground parts of the plant will die in freezing weather. Tubers in soil are generally safe for overnight chills down to 25F, but they'll start to freeze if that continues for more than 8 hours. Frozen tubers are dead tubers."
So I continued to keep them outside and protected
The green gave me hope that the tubers were safe.

Tubers looked great.
Around the first week of December I took these 3 plants into the house putting them in a clear storage tote. I found they continues to bulk up and the tops stopped growing.
Th results of today's harvest
I have learned enough to be able to do a better job of growing them next year.
I will keep them in containers where I can move them around. And get them out of the heat on high heat and humid days. Because I lost 10 of 13 plants the first day heat went up to 97f.   But these were in a more protected area. I also will have them started early to obtain more top growth. As the 3rd plant and some of the others did not grow enough green to stay alive and develop tubers.

These are the 3 variety's,
Oca-OC-14-2x08x05
Yellow with Light red (pink)
Country of origin Bolivia 
is an abundant flowerier, which set quite a bit of seed in it's state of origin. .


Oca-OC-14-1x14x08
Light red (pink) White

I may be the only person in the world with OC-14-1x14x08.

OC-14-1x10x15
 Purple-red
 The most promising variety for yield can have more than 2 pounds from the seedling. It appears I have none of these.






recipes for use

1 comment:

angela said...

I've never seen these before. Hopefully next year you will get a better harvest. We are constantly learning.