Potato News from Alaska

Genetically distinct from its European counterparts, this coastal Alaska potato predates modern taste for russets and Yukon Golds.

Alaskan potato farms with irrigation had a good year, but farms that didn't have irrigation lost much of their potato yield.

Jenifer Huang McBeath of the University of Alaska Fairbanks has been researching biological controls and developing environmentally friendly methods for farmers to combat plant diseases since 1985. She never intended to switch her focus to potatoes...

Golden birch trees marked the edge of Greg Kalal's fields, but the dentist-turned-farmer was more interested in hues beneath the soil on his land south of Mount McKinley. Among the thousands of colorful potatoes — from yellow German Butterballs to Mag...

Potato late blight, that same disease that caused the Irish Potato Famine, resurfaced in Alaska this fall. This wasn’t the first time the disease, widespread in the Lower 48 and worldwide, came to Alaska. Plant pathologist Jenifer McBeath suspects it...

Late blight has shown up in the fields of two potato producers, in Palmer and Delta Junction. Alaska. The University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service is working with major potato producers to help prevent the spread.

A new line of potato developed at the University of Alaska (at the Matanuska Experiment Farm in Palmer) stands to boost Alaska's agriculture industry with its consumer plate appeal. “It has high potential,” said Carol Lewis, dean of the University of ...