Potato fruit facts for kids
The potato fruit is a small, green fruit that grows on a potato plant after its flowers bloom. It looks a lot like a tiny green cherry tomato. But be careful! Unlike the potato you eat, this fruit is poisonous.
Contents
What is a Potato Fruit?
After a potato plant flowers, it can produce small, round, green fruits. These fruits are about the size of a cherry tomato and each one contains around 300 tiny seeds.
Why Are Potato Fruits Toxic?
Almost every part of the potato plant, except for the underground potato (which is actually a tuber), contains a natural chemical called solanine. This includes the leaves, stems, and especially the green fruits. Solanine is poisonous if eaten, so potato fruits are not safe for people or animals to consume.
How Do Potato Plants Make Fruit?
Potato plants usually produce these green fruits when the weather is cool and they get enough water. For example, in 2014, many gardeners in Michigan, United States, were surprised to see these fruits on their potato plants. This happened because July that year was cooler and wetter than usual. This weather gave the potato flowers enough time to be pollinated and then grow into fruits.
Growing New Potato Plants
New types of potatoes are often grown from the tiny seeds found inside these fruits. These seeds are sometimes called "true potato seed" or "botanical seed." This helps people create brand new kinds of potatoes!
However, most potatoes are grown by planting pieces of the potato tuber itself. If you plant a piece of a potato with an "eye" (a small sprout), it will grow into a new plant that is exactly like the parent potato. This is a way of "cloning" the plant.
Potato Fruits in Stories
Sometimes, potato fruits appear in books! In a short story called The Leopard Lady by Dorothy L. Sayers, a child gets sick from eating potato fruits. This story was published in 1939 in a collection called In the Teeth of the Evidence.
See also
In Spanish: Fruto de la papa para niños
