If you are concerned about personal food security, here is a garden-to-table, sustainable, nutritious, and fun springtime project and a great way to prepare to grow sweet potatoes in your container garden, raised bed, or directly into non-clay ground where the soil has been well-worked.
It’s easy and cheap! And unlike most garden vegetables, sweet potatoes aren’t grown from seeds.
Some of you may remember when you were back in grade school and would try to sprout a promising-looking sweet potato with toothpicks in a jar of water to make a cool house plant.
Remember, the spud has to be organic because the conventional ones are treated with a chemical to inhibit sprouting!
You might have produced a robust, green vining plant OR the result may have been a rotting mess of sweet potato. To know which end should go up in your glass of water, simply place an organic tuber in a warm place for 1-2 weeks (I just set them behind my kitchen sink), and let the buds emerge. That end goes up!
But there is a faster, more successful, way!
The Fastest Surefire Way to Start Sweet Potato Slips
Sweet potato slips can be started in two ways, in water or in dirt. Of course, both propagation methods work, but starting a slip from an organic sweet potato in dirt is the more rapid method.
Set several small or medium whole sweet potato tubers on their sides, half exposed, in peat moss or potting soil in a plastic or aluminum pan with a few drain holes and a catch plate.
Keep the bed evenly moist (but not soggy), and in a few weeks shoots will emerge to grow upwards. Put it in a warm, sunny window or under a Grow-Lamp. (See 2 minute video below).
Slips will be abundant in four to six weeks, and abundance is what you want:
The slips take about a total of eight weeks to mature, so you should be starting sweet potato slips about six weeks before your LAST frost date in the spring.
The timing is important if you want to grow large, tasty sweet potatoes. This plant loves warm weather and should be planted only when the soil reaches a consistent 65 degrees F. (18 C.).
Included in that time, slips grown indoors need to be gradually exposed to strong summer sun over a period of 1-2 weeks. This is easily accomplished by placing the mother plants in warm filtered shade out of strong winds.
But wait. Aren’t sweet potatoes a tropical crop, difficult to grow in cool climates? Barbara Pleasant says, “Yes and no. In recent field trials in chilly New Hampshire, for example, fast-maturing varieties like ‘Beauregard‘ and ‘Covington‘ produced three to four nice tubers per plant when planted into black plastic mulch, which helps warm the soil. Still, you will get a bigger harvest when growing sweet potatoes in a warm climate than a cool one. In warmer climates, gardeners sometimes harvest eight or more tubers per sweet potato plant. (source)
Gathering and Rooting Slips:
Take the slips from the main organic sweet potato root by twisting them while tugging on the slip.
Once you have the slips in hand, place them in a glass or jar of water for about two weeks.
And when the roots look strong and your soil is 65 degrees, they are ready to plant. It doesn’t take long.
Planting Outside:
If you have several large container(s) (like 55 gallon blue drums, hacksawed in half), that will work, but they need 3-4 drain holes drilled.
Where the vines touch the soil, they will set roots, and you may or may not want that. I don’t let this happen in my pretty stone garden paths.
Years ago, my sweet husband and our sons made raised 4’x8′ garden boxes for us, so it will be easier for us to harvest.
Sweet Potato Tips:
They like it very warm when you set them out, well after the last frost date.
Feeding – Mix a very light application of a balanced organic fertilizer (12-12-12) into the soil before planting. Too much and there will be small potatoes and excessive vines.
Spacing – 18” (45cm) apart, each way (minimum) and 4″ deep.
Harvesting – Potatoes are usually ready as the ends of vines begin to turn yellow or just before frost. Harvest before frost as cool temperatures can reduce tuber quality and storage. To harvest, find the primary crown of the plant you want to dig, and use a digging fork to loosen an 18-inch wide circle around the plant. Pull up the crown and use your hands to gather sweet potatoes. Cut vines out of your way before digging. Cure tubers to develop sweetness by lightly brushing off soil, laying unwashed tubers in a warm (80°F to 90°F), well-ventilated place for about 10 days.
Storage – Store sweet potatoes in a cool, dry spot. Do not refrigerate or store below 50°F. Cured sweet potatoes can keep up to 4-6 months when stored around 60°F with high humidity. A basement is ideal, though a cool storage room works, too.
Troubleshooting – Deer are fond of sweet potato vines.
2 minute visual recap:
Bonus: The leaves are edible! This 9 minute fun video shows cooking sweet potato leaves. Is easy and nutritious:
With the coming food supply shortage and difficult times ahead, this is the right time to experiment with growing more of your own food!
I hope I have inspired you to give this a try.
More Resources:
4 Ways To Keep Monsanto Out Of Your Home Garden
Prepper’s Booklist: Key Books & Tips For the Prepared Family
Ideas For Planning The Well-Producing, Sustainable Family Garden
Potager French Garden Style: Combining Edible & Flowering Plants
How to Build A Durable Wind & Weather-Resistant Trellis
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Terry Skytte
Do you have directions that are printable? I would love one. Thank you.
Jacqueline
Hi, Terry, you can print it with the print feature at the end pf the post. I have a few others in a shortened printable format, but not this one. ~J
Stacey R
I love your garden – so beautiful! I have a question which I posited and this article came up from that inquiry. My organic sweet potatoes that I buy from the store will spontaneously sprout slips, since they are in a hanging basket next to our bright kitchen windows. (My ginger root and potatoes also sprout this way!) This year I anxiously waited until the weather warmed up, selected a few choice slips and rooted them in water on our window sill and then planted them. They have not grown one bit! They are alive, not withered, but not growing, so probably not growing big root systems. I don’t know what I am doing wrong and can’t find any info on it. Our yard is really hot, but they like the hot – maybe the air isn’t humid enough? I live in So Cal and we are having quite a dry year? Maybe it is because I didn’t properly grow the slips? I also wonder if maybe it is because I didn’t harden them off, as your instructions say – I’ve not read that anywhere else, but makes a lot of sense – especially with the move to our hot yard.
Jacqueline
Hi, Stacey R,
I am not sure you did anything wrong – it could possibly be the lack of hardening off, however, they would likely have sun-burned in the hot sun if they really needed to be treated more tenderly at the start.
I am thinking it might be more a problem with the soil. Was the soil there worked and amended at all? If it was hard and dry, or low in needed/adequate nutrients, they might have struggled for those reasons.
Consider putting out mulch to age over the winter so when you do put your slips out next year, they will have plenty of good soil to grow in.
Water them in well and maintain till you know the roots are going deep to get water themselves. Rain water is best, instead of from the hose.
I hope that helps and you don’t give up!
Blessings,
Jacqueline
Nancy Curry
I am planning my garden for 2023 and this is the 2nd year to do a garden. Im wanting to use heirloom seeds but when it came to selecting corn seeds, I became unsure. I was looking at a variety called Peaches and Cream. It is called a hybrid and yet it is an heirloom. It is GMO-free. From what I understand an heirloom can become a hybrid by nature. With this in mind, is this a seed that is acceptable or should I stay from all hybrids even if it mutated within its open-pollination design? Thank you for your insight! (Hope and pray all is well with you and your family! Long time no see!)
Jacqueline
Hi, Nancy! It has been a long time, but I feel still very close at heart to you and Bob.
I am not 100% sure because it may depend on the company and how they derived their seed stock.
This is interesting: “Sugar Enhanced (SE) corn contains a gene that significantly raises the sugar content above standard SU varieties. This variety is the most popular type as it retains tenderness and texture the best. A perfect type for roadside stands and markets.” Found here: https://www.ufseeds.com/vegetables/corn/sugar-enhanced-se-corn That is where it may be a good idea to ask the company you will be buying from if the patent on that variety is held by Bayer/Monsanto or other.
Then I read down to Peaches and Cream, and see it is an F1 (nothing wrong with an F1): https://www.gardeningknowhow.com/garden-how-to/propagation/seeds/f1-hybrid-seeds.htm
I wish I knew more! We gave up here on corn due to voracious racoons here and bc our son may have a bit of a corn allergy. I’d be curious what you find.
God bless you both and sending peace,
Jacque
Jennifer
Hey there! I know this is an older post, but I was looking for it because it is the right season to start sweet potato vines.
I tried this a few weeks ago with some sweet potatoes from my panrty and nothing ever sprouted. So I looked online for information to see if conventional ( that’s what I had) s.p. would sprout and found out that they are treated with a chemical to inhibit sprouting!
Anyway, I just wanted to save folks from wasting weeks on something that probably won’t work.
If you’re going to grow your own, use ORGANIC!
If you already stated this in your post and I missed it, my apologies!
Happy Gardening!
Jacqueline
Jennifer, thank you for stating that again here! Very important as it will affect the outcome of the whole thing!
Bless you, Jacque