My 2012 Sweet Potato Journal/post #26 starts 2013!

[seedcrazy]

Great harvest. This year I had a sweet potato growing in the kitchen so I buried half of it in the dirt and start breaking off the vines when they got about 6-8 inches long. I ended up with 6 or 7 to plant. I never grew them before so I took a big tub (some kind of protein powder comes in them to feed horses - nieghbor gave it to me) and I drilled holes in the bottom and when I went to repot something I dumped the old promix in the tub along with some chopped leaves and garden soil. I ended up with a whole box of sweet potatoes to eat on this summer. It was great and I'll do it again next year! I would post pics but I'm at work and I cannot remember my password so I can get on at home which is where all my pics are.

 

[Gardening with Rabbits]

Today I dug bed #3 and got 13 pounds of sweet potatoes. There wasn't as many grub worms in this bed. Bed #3 is 4 1/2'x6'. I added up the square footage of the 3 beds and the total is approximately 40 square feet. I harvested 52 pounds of sweet potatoes total. I didn't get as much from bed #3, it was planted a month later than the first two from vine cuttings I took from beds #1 & #2. I should have taken more cuttings and planted them closer together in bed #3. Overall, I am very pleased with my harvest and plan on planting sweet potatoes again next year. Just for grins, before I yanked up the vines, I took cuttings of 6 to 8 inches and stuck in a vase of water. If I can keep them alive untill next spring, then I will already have my slips to get going all over again!

Soooo....... does anyone have 101 recipies for sweet potatoes????

That is amazing. I am trying to figure out what you did. You did not plant in a row and you "SHOULD HAVE TAKEN MORE CUTTINGS AND PLANTED THEM CLOSER TOGETHER" and so can you explain this real slow for me??? I have sweet potato slips ordered, but in my window in the kitchen I have 5 sweet potatoes with vines. I have been cutting the vines for the rabbits and I am not sure what kind they are. There is one that was a yellow flesh sweet potato and the others are orange. When I plant the ones I bought, then I could take cuttings from those and have slips for next year and keep some going for the rabbits. I bought Beauregard sweet potatoes from Park Seed. I think 25 for $17 something. So, when I have my ground worked and the weather gets warm then I plant these in a bed close together? When I was a kid my mother always had a sweet potato vine growing in the kitchen and had purple flowers, but since I am cutting mine for the rabbits they have not had flowers. If keeping for cuttings for planting, will they have flowers or should they be planted before that? I should leave one of mine alone and let it flower.

 

[baymule]

Stop cutting your vines for the rabbits for awhile and let 'em grow! Then take the vines and cut in 8-10" peices and plant them. That will give you more slips to plant. They will make MASSES of vines. I cut some of mine for the chickens. When I dug the sweet potatoes, I fed the vines to the chickens. I staggered digging each bed, so I wouldn't feed the vines all at one time.

Once the vines got to a good size, (read that as a LOT of vines) they started blooming. They bloomed all summer. You gotta dig them before it frosts. I dug mine in October.

I planted bed #1 & #2 at the same time. As the vines took root and grew, I snipped slips from them and stuck more in the beds. About a couple of weeks after I planted beds #1 &2, I cut more slips and planted bed #3. They were randomly placed 8-10 inches apart. I really think I could have planted them closer together.

Your yellow sweet potato sounds intriguing. If is is sweet and good, plant lots of those slips. Will you be planting in beds or rows? I haven't planted in rows, only in the beds.

 

[Gardening with Rabbits]

I need more room, so I am going to build a raised bed for them. The ones from the store I am not sure what kind. The ones I bought are Beauregard Sweet Potatoes and are best for colder climates. I may go ahead and take slips from the store ones and try them too. The yellow is really good, but I read the orange have more vitamin A. I have read 1 foot apart and even 2 feet apart, but you said you could have put them closer, so I am not sure. I bought 25 slips. How much room do I need?

 

[baymule]

I have a very small space so I tend to cram everything together. If you have plenty of room, then go ahead and give them room. There is no wrong in gardening, there is only what works best for you. It is awesome that we can come here and share our successes and failures, share our knowledge and help each other.

Just make sure they have plenty of good loose dirt. And once the vines get established, you can take cuttings from them and plant them too!

 

[baymule]

This marks the official start to the 2013 sweet potato growing season!! I currently have 3 bowls of water with toothpicked sweet potatoes in them and vines up to 4' long. More are sprouting and growing longer and longer. I have them on the breakfast table where I started my garden plants under lights, so it looks like the table will be commandeered a little longer! I want to grow more sweets this season as we enjoyed the sweet potatoes so much! I kept a couple of distorted, weird big sweets to start vines from, plus several small ones that had the purpley sprouts starting to show.

Let the 2013 sweet potato season commence!

 

[897tgigvib]

Sounds like a SWEET plan Bay!

What's a breakfast table?

 

[baymule]

What's a breakfast table?

It's a table you eat for breakfast. Duh!

 

[catjac1975]

Bay!!!! Those circular depressions. That's what I was asking about in another post. What causes that????Great posts!

I dug 2 of the sweet potato beds last weekend. Bed #1 & #2 each are 2'x4'. I got 22 pounds out of bed #1 and 17 pounds out of bed #2. The chickens got all the vines. I still have one bed left. I planted it about 2 weeks later than the other two, so I will wait a little longer before I dig it.

My helper. Our 5 year old grand daughter who had a blast with her mamaw digging in the dirt!

http://www.theeasygarden.com/forum/uploads/7949_sweet_potato_and_cohen.jpg

I dug up a bunch of nasty grubworms that had been feasting on my sweet potatoes! Some have damage on them, but I figure we will eat these first.

http://www.theeasygarden.com/forum/uploads/7949_sweet_potato_grubworm_damage.jpg

I washed the dirt off with the hose and let them dry. I lug them in every night and lay them in the shade in the grass every morning so they can cure. I am so excited to grow these! Thirty-nine pounds of sweets, from 2 store bought sweet potatoes that were sprouting! Not bad. I will definately do this again next summer. I am happy to find something that grows so well in our scorching heat and looks attractive too!

 

[baymule]

Grub worms!! There ought to be some recipe we could use on those things since they eat so much of our garden root crops! But after thinking about it....... maybe not! I dug my beds and practically sifted the soil, picking out grubworms, when I planted my new potatoes, also when I dug them in May. I fed them to the chickens. hahaha! Take THAT you stinkin' grubworms!!