Sweet potatoes

[eyegrotom]

I am thinking about growing sweet potatoes for the first time. Only need two or three plants so I am thinking about starting a couple from seed are sprouting a store-bought sweet potato.
So I'm looking for your thoughts, ideals or tips on this. Mike

[worth1]

Don't plant them in the ground until the soil is warm, it wont do you any good and you wont be any farther ahead.

[Shule]

[mention]eyegrotom[/mention]

* Unlike regular potatoes, I hear you can eat the leaves.
* They're in the morning glory family.
* I hear they're hard to dig out of clay without slicing them. Never tried it, though.
* If you start your slips in water in your windowsill extra early, you can get cuttings of them to get more starts ready.
* Sand Hill Preservation Center sells a lot of kinds of sweet potatoes.

Do you have true sweet potato seed? That would be pretty awesome.

[mention]worth1[/mention]
Will they be any worse off for it?

[worth1]

When I grow sweet potatoes I always eat the leaves and tender tips.
Yes they can be worse off planting them too soon in northern climates.
More later.

[worth1]

Go to sandhill preservation and look up sweet potatoes there is a good read on them.

[Paquebot]

Start from slips as it's rare that they produce seeds. If you have a WalMart nearby, their garden section should have 6-packs of Beauregard. For soil prep, till nutrients into usual 8" depth. Then mound 10" above that with loose soil. Plant into that mound. No problem to dig them.

Martin

[eyegrotom]

Go to sandhill preservation and look up sweet potatoes there is a good read on them.

Thanks for the tip worth. Lots of good information

[Rajun Gardener]

The easiest method to get starts is plant a whole sweet potato and let it grow, when you're ready to plant just break off the slips and plant. A slip is a sprout with roots. Or you can soak the whole sweet potato in a tub of water, either way they grow without care.

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[brownrexx]

Last year I grew sweet potatoes for the first time and I took Paquebot's advice and bought a 6-pack of plants at Walmart in late May when my soil is warm.

They grew really well BUT I got some really huge potatoes like 5 pounders. I realize that the problem was my hard clay soil so next year I will fluff up the soil better and plant them in mounds.

Another thing to do is to pull up the vines every once in a while to prevent them from rooting along the vines. They will produce small potatoes at the rooting point and take away from the main crop.

[zendog]

I'm sure you can find them at local nurseries and big box stores, but I think you'll be limited to basic varieties. More interesting varieties (to me) can be bought online and I've done that and had them shipped. I've only done that to get a new variety I want since the cost with shipping is a bit much. Once I have the variety, it is easy to save a tater or 2 and get all the slips I'll need the next year. If you buy sweet potatoes you like locally, you can also try to start your own slips from those.

I stick a few toothpicks in the sides to support them and put the bottom, root side in the water in a jar or bowl. When a slip is around 8 leaves long, I cut off 2/3 of it and put the cut end in the water to root while the stub left behind starts growing a new slip. The cut-off ones that root will eventually get long enough to divide as well. Here are three little runty blue/purple ones I used for a couple of dozen slips last year. This is when they were just starting.

blueslips.jpg

Here is Garnet spud (bought from a local organic grocer) that has already made the dozen or so slips I needed, but refused to slow down. I gave it to another gardener at the community garden I use and they had plenty long enough within a week or so of the picture. The dog was watching the evil squirrels who might do them harm.

garnetslips.jpg

I usually start the sweet potatoes in the water around mid-February, since some can be a bit slow to start growing. Some folks grow them in soil, but I like the water since I can easily see what is going on and it is easy to just drop the cut off slips in the water for rooting. It's a fun project.

Most that you would get from a grocery store to start slips from are going to be the vining type. But there are a few "bush" types that are basically just shorter vines that branch more from the base. The bush types are a little less productive, but that isn't surprising since they are using less space. Vardman (classic orange color) is my favorite bush type and the leaves emerge as a nice purplish color before going green as they mature. The vining type go everywhere and might need pruning or at least directing to keep them under control. I grow them at the base of my tomatoes and peppers as a living mulch to suppress weeds and shade the soil in the heat of the summer. And yes, eat the greens! Great sauteed and are running rampant in the summer heat when the other greens are sulking, bolting or dead.

[eyegrotom]

I should also add that my Plan is to grow them under/with my tomato plants

[Paquebot]

I should also add that my Plan is to grow them under/with my tomato plants

Even the shortest varieties will have vines out 5' or more in all directions. They are not good companions.

Martin

[zendog]

I should also add that my Plan is to grow them under/with my tomato plants

Even the shortest varieties will have vines out 5' or more in all directions. They are not good companions.

Martin

I've grown them under my tomatoes and peppers for several years and it works great for me. Since the vines are just sprawling on the ground below the plants there is little root competition, etc. The biggest challenge is making sure the vines don't get too shaded or you wind up with fewer/smaller potatoes. Of course if a vine starts heading up a tomato plant I do pull them down.

Here is what I harvested from a 3x9 raised bed last year with a line of 9 single stem tomatoes across the back of the bed and 4 hills of the sweet potatoes in the front. The vines covered all the surface of the bed and tumbled into the aisles around the bed. These are the blue potatoes I grow.

bluetomatoes.jpg

[Paquebot]

FYI The root system of a single sweet potato will extend over 3' in all directions. That's why they are not good companions for any other vegetable.

Martin

[worth1]

Sweet potatoes beg to sprout and put forth vines.
Just sticking one end in a container of soil works just as well.

Cows and sweet potatoes do not mix.

[Paquebot]

To add to what worth wrote, they sprout best between 80ºF and 85ºF. I start mine in mid-February in water in pint jar over an aquarium light. Maintains 82ºF from a 40w bulb. Have used the soil method but takes longer.

Martin

[bower]

How warm is warm enough for a sweet potato? Like beans? Like peppers? Warmer soil than for tomatoes?
Are they at all hardy if you get a cold night?

[Paquebot]

How warm is warm enough for a sweet potato? Like beans? Like peppers? Warmer soil than for tomatoes?
Are they at all hardy if you get a cold night?

If it is 90ºF, they'll love it. Here in the frigid North, standard procedure is to make the mounded rows several weeks before the planting time. Then cover it with black plastic. That will heat the soil. Sweet potato slips are then planted in slits in the plastic. That should give you an idea of what they like. BUT, fair warning. If you have voles, the plastic becomes their hotel and you will end up with empty shells!\

sweet potatoes are very tropical. qqqThey can stand absolutely no frost. In fact, the vines should not be allowed to freeze. If they do, it will affect the storage abiliaty.

Martin

[SQWIB]

I started a couple slips from last years harvest and half them once they are long. I got a couple growing in our turtle tank too.

They're still hanging in there after 3 months.

[Bronx]

Been growing sweet potatoes in an Earthbox for a few seasons. I get a surprising number of potatoes from just 6 slips in 1 Earthbox.

For the past 2 years been growing purple sweet potatoes from a potato I originally bought at Sprouts market. It wasn't in the organic section so I took a chance that it would produce slips and it did.

Last year's harvest is especially sweet and I'm enjoying them now. Cure them in a huge Igloo cooler in the garage, on portable racks with a seed starting heated mat and container of water at the bottom. Seems to work OK.