What was the cause of the Irish potato famine?

The Great Famine was caused by a failure of the potato crop, which many people relied on for most of their nutrition. A disease called late blight destroyed the leaves and edible roots of the potato plants in successive years from 1845 to 1849.

How did potato blight get to Ireland?

The cause was actually an airborne fungus (phytophthora infestans) originally transported in the holds of ships traveling from North America to England. Winds from southern England carried the fungus to the countryside around Dublin.

How did the Irish grow potatoes?

The traditional Irish method of planting the potato was in “lazy beds”. Low drenches were dug at about three foot intervals. Early potatoes were ready after about 100 days with a second crop in about 110-120 days. The main crop matured in about 130 days.

How many Irish died on the coffin ships?

Many famine ships of the time were known as “coffin ships” and saw many deaths due to their unseaworthy nature, overcrowding, lack of clean drinking water, unsanitary conditions and the rampant spread of disease. It is estimated that up to 100,000 people died on board these ships.

What did they eat in Ireland before potatoes?

For veggies, the Irish relied on cabbages, onions, garlic, and parsnips, with some wild herbs and greens spicing up the plate, and on the fruit front, everyone loved wild berries, like blackberries and rowanberries, but only apples were actually grown on purpose.

What was the cause of the Irish Potato Famine?

Scientists have long known that it was a strain of Phytophthora infestans (or P. infestans) that caused the widespread devastation of potato crops in Ireland and northern Europe beginning in 1845, leading to the Irish Potato Famine. P. infestans infects the plant through its leaves,…

How did farmers preserve genetic variation in potatoes?

Later, scientists identified resistance genes in a potato from South America, where farmers have preserved the genetic variation of potatoes by growing many cultivated varieties alongside the potato’s wild cousins. The image below compares the effect of a blight on diverse and cloned crops.

Why did the Irish plant lumper potatoes in the 1800s?

Heeding the warnings of scientists and history may help us prevent wide-scale crop devastation due to changing environmental conditions. In the 1800s, the Irish solved their problem of feeding a growing population by planting potatoes. Specifically, they planted the “lumper” potato variety.

Why did the Irish Catholics rely on potatoes?

The ability to rent a piece of land was often the difference between starvation and survival for many Irish Catholics. Because of the changing rural economy, more and more people came to rely on the potato. This was chiefly because potatoes could grow quickly and did not require much land to provide a large crop [4].

How did they solve the Potato Famine mystery?

To solve the mystery, molecular biologists from the United Kingdom, Germany and the United States examined DNA extracted from nearly a dozen botanical specimens dating back as far as 1845 and held in museum collections in the UK and Germany, which were then sent to the Sainsbury Laboratory in Norwich, England.