We grew 20 lbs of Okinawa Sweet Potatoes! I really didn't expect to get any harvest from the slips that Indy gave me in 2015, but I rather added them to the food forest as ground cover. Lots of food forest plans include Sweet Potatoes as a ground cover to increase microbial life and to crowd out weeds, so I was happy to get them going crazy in the banana circle, the food forest, and in a few pots for fun. The sweet potato vines are prolific here in central Florida and really did make it tough for weeds to survive in the banana circle. They've escaped from pots in a few other places out back in the nursery, and they are a simple but beautiful green ground cover wherever they grow. Bugs don't eat the leaves, so they always look fresh and green.
But the real surprise came in the 2 whiskey barrels that I planted some slips in 2 years ago. Last year we had a cold winter with a couple of freezes, and when I checked for potatoes last winter after a year of growth I didn't find any potatoes. I probably didn't dig down deep enough, but rather only grabbed a tiny fingerling or two near the surface and decided they must not have got enough of whatever they needed to produce food.
I was out last Sunday digging through pots to try to clean up for the new growing season, and I decided I would finally clean out the whiskey barrels. The vines were incredibly long, growing way out of the pots and around the area by the papaya patch (Pip, Pop, and Peep). As I pulled the vines out to clear out the pots for new plantings, I found THIS:
It's about 20 lbs of sweet potatoes! The largest one in the lower left corner is 1 lb 13 oz, and an average sized one (upper right) is 3/4 of a pound. I'm happy! I had to dig many of them out of the bottom layer of the wood whiskey barrels, as they were lodged deep in the crevaces.
My takeaway here is that there are a LOT of these beasts throughout the property where there are vines! I think that's pretty cool. I don't need that many sweet potatoes, so rather than disturb the banana circle I'll probably just leave them there and see what happens. The microbes down in the ground licking the roots will thank me.
What's the future here at P2 for sweet potatoes? Interestingly enough, even before I found these guys in the pots, I had already decided that I need to try growing sweet potatoes of different varieties this year. Indy had given me Okinawa sweet potatoes (white on the outside, purple on the inside), but I know Mark prefers REAL sweet potatoes with yellow flesh.
On January 30th, I placed an order with Gurney's for a LOT of sweet potato slips. They had a half price sale, and I figured why not try EVERY variety! I ordered 12 slips of each:
- Beauregard
- Bush Porto Rico
- Georgia Jet
- Majesty (purple)
- O'Henry
- Covington
- Vardaman
The tomato cage is officially converted to a sweet potato cage, complete with 10 25-gallon fabric pots. The vines will grow and be trained up the strings and hooks, just like the tomatoes. It's going to be fun!
I also have plans for a 100' x 10' sweet potato patch out on the far property by the little pond. There's a sandy patch that the previous owner made to potentially build something on, but it's just a sandy mound. Perfect for sweet potatoes. Between the sweet potato cage and the sweet potato patch, and the whiskey barrels, I will hopefully find places to plant 84 sweet potato plants. Ok, I went overboard a bit, but why not!
