Potato, Happy Red

True potato seed information and growing instructions

Potato products and sizes

True potato seeds are classified as breeding seeds and germination is not guaranteed.

This is an OSSI open source variety. Click for more information about open source seeds.

Phytosanitary information

TPS will be offered infrequently. In vitro plantlets and tubers may be offered occasionally.

Happy Red is one of two selections (Happy Banana is the other) that I made from the cross of BS278 x Bloody Banana.  BS278 is a dihaploid developed in Canada.  It was developed as a tetraploid potato and then reduced to a haploid, which makes it diploid.  This makes it possible to cross a diploid potato like Bloody Banana with a potato that has been heavily selected for more mainstream commercial traits, normally found only in tetraploids.  This selection obviously doesn’t look much like Bloody Banana and favors the more commercial traits, but it is quite an interesting potato on the balance.  Because it is not a great producer of TPS, I will probably not offer more seed once this batch runs out.

Culinary Traits

Happy Red is a starchy potato with light, dry, particularly aromatic flesh.  The flesh is light yellow.  It mashes and roasts very nicely and would probably also fry well.  The skin is moderately thick.

Agronomic Traits

This is a mid season potato in my climate and might be by early in a warmer spot.  Yields have averaged just over four pounds per plant at maturity.  Tubers are mostly in the 2-5 inch range.  Tubers have very short stolons, so you get a nice, big pile of tubers directly under the center of the plant.  Dormancy is on the short side, about three months.  Happy Red is male sterile due to its commercial potato ancestry and it is not a great seed producer.

Fertility:  MF0, FF5

True Seed (TPS)

TPS of Happy Red is open pollinated and will be 100% outcrossed.  The nearest neighbors were Trippy Banana, Melosilla, Blue Spruce, and Valparaiso.  The results should be extremely diverse, so much so that I don’t think I could predict.  It should be a good source of higher yielding diploids.