Growing Sweet Potatoes Garden

Growing sweet potatoes vegetable plants can help you to fertilise your school organic garden beds in an inexpensive way.

Sweet Potato plant is a perennial. It comes with large, tuberous roots, and creeping stems.

This potato plant´s Morning-Glory a-like leaves are running freely along the ground. So, you can use them as a ground cover; if you wish.

Sweet potato plant seldom produces flowers in the cold location; so you can only enjoy the edible green leaves; and the aromatic potatoes.

This root crop needs a very long, dry and hot growing season. Therefore; you have to think about how to grow sweet potatoes efficiently; if you are situated at a cold area.

In order to experience the success; it is better to do several experiments to discover the possibilities with a short growing season; before you start planting them.

The Benefits of Planting Sweet Potatoes

This plant is a crop to help you to cover the soil during the hottest part of the summer. It is a summer cover crop.
When this summer legume is turned under; it forms humus which will transform the physical condition of those non-essential soils that are hard to work into loam; to be more retentive of moisture.
It helps to balance the temperature of your soil. It makes your soil cooler in summer and warmer in winter.
The vine is a vigorous grower, so, you will have unlimited supply of green leafy table vegetables; if you grow them in rich soil.
The leaves can use for mulching; if you are not eating them.
The ornamental vine can use for decoration purposes. So, you can grow in water as a house-plant.

Growing Sweet Potatoes Possibilities

If you could not provide a good, warm, south spot for these sweet potatoes plants; you can also grow them in a less warm, but dry, good drainage; sandy soil at the north side of your garden.

If you are situated at a warm location; a good deep soil would drive the roots downward, and the result is long, spindling potatoes.

If you are living in a cold location; container growing may be best suitable for a short warm season. So, the potatoes might be short and compact.

Harvesting sweet potatoes while growing, before the danger of a killing frost touches the vines. Do the same as white potatoes; let the roots lie out to dry in the dark after digging.

Propagation can be done by cuttings, sets or slips.

Growing Sweet Potatoes Project Facts

From first sprout to grown sweet potato slips took 111 days.
From strong slips to 1st transplant to greenhouse took 90 days.
From transplanting to tubers enlarging took 46 days.
Therefore, from 1st day to harvest would take more than 247 days.
Nature had taken full care for the last 22 days, because we were away for vacation.

Project Awareness

No matter how much cleaning job you have done on the greenhouse tables; there are still minute insects eggs in the soil could survived over the winter.
When you are growing the plants in raised bed, you can guide their vines any way you wish. Take care not to break them.
When you grow sweet potato in a rounded plate; you are actually restricting the plant for growing too wild. You can guide the vine vertically. And you can harvest your organic potatoes easily without digging.

Sweet Potato Plants Performance

*These 3 plants were grown in the greenhouse since 29 May 2012.

*On 13-7-2012 insect attacked one of the leaf from the tallest plant (below picture 1).

*On 14-7-2012 the leaves are enlarging (picture 2).

Image 1-4

*On 18-7-2012 discovered the green pests (picture 3).

*On 3-8-2012 the tallest plant reached the greenhouse roof (picture 4). It was transferred to a rounded plate of organic soil.