>> jimster, you can buy seed on Ebay for $3 including shipping. Yeah, one can. I completely endorse it for anyone who has money to burn and garden space to waste. I've been thinking about joining them - I must have 5,000 Bhut Jolokia seeds, or at least ones that look like the BJ! Mike

The bigger ones are about 2 inches across the middle and the little ones are about 1 inch across the middle. We planted on Saturday April 20th. A friend gave me the bag of seed potatoes because they didn't have room for them and they thought it was too late. But I had extra room and wanted to see how it would go. The weather in April was still really cool at nights and even during the day sometimes it was only around 65 degrees. Very unusual for Jacksonville. Even now we are still in the 70s some days. We've also had some really heavy downpours of rain. I'm not sure what factors really contributed to the potatoes growth, but I'm glad about it! I was excited just to see what the plants looked like... and the other day I got curious so I stuck my hand down under one of the plants about 8 inches and there were potatoes there! :) So I decided to harvest that one plant to see what level the potatoes were growing and how many might be under each plant. I will pull another on up next Wednesday and report back with better pictures.

I don't see why not. Once they are in full bloom I would stop though. Also I probably wouldn't cover more than 50 percent of the exposed plant at one time.

The original Hillbilly variety is RL and has been listed for many years in the SSE Yearbooks. The PL version was first listed by Jerry Lee Bonner of Ohio in the 1994 SSE Yearbook. And I guess the assumption is that the PL version is the same as the original RL version except for leaf form. There are well over 100 different varieties of these gold/red bicolors that are known and grown. The appearance is quite similar as are the tastes of the different varieties, but differences in the degree of the seondary color that moves upwards from the blossom end and is also found in the interior does differ and some are very prone to radial and concentric cracking at the stem end. The flesh of all of them is soft so they don't have a long shelf life. In good years they can be fruity and sweet but the same variety grown the next year can be mushy and bland, In my experience they are just plain fussy and react strongly to weather as to taste and performance. I've grown many gold/red bicolors and for sure have my own favorites. Carolyn