Sweet Potato Vine
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Does anyone know how I can start my own sweet potatoe vine plants. The variety I am interested in is Tricolor or Pink Frost.
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(post #14352, reply #1 of 10)
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Tricolor is fairly widely avaible, but Pink Frost is new. You'll just have to keep an eye out for it. I haven't come across it in any catalog or sites.
(post #14352, reply #2 of 10)
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AMG, if you buy one or two, you may be able to start cuttings for more off of them. I've yet to try it (will be soon) but they look like they'd be easy.
(post #14352, reply #3 of 10)
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Wasn't it the sweet potato that every school kid grows as a Science project by sticking 3 toothpicks in it and suspending it in a glass of water on the windowsill? Seems to me they were really easy to grow.
(post #14352, reply #4 of 10)
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Creta, we've wondered in previous discussions whether that would work with the ornamentals. No one had tried it, but we all figured why not. They do create tubers and every year I dig them and say I'm going to try it. I wonder if they're still in the basement and still any good? AMG, it won't help you now, but for next year, dig up the whole plant and see if it has any tubers. Cut the tops off and make more plants from the cuttings, save the tubers and then try to make new plants from the tuber in early spring as Creta described. Let us know how it works! Who knows when I'll get around to it.
(post #14352, reply #5 of 10)
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I have tubers from chartreuse and black leaved cultivars in the garage waiting for warmer weather. I dug them out of their pot last fall and set them on top of the dirt to be stored away. Never did get back to them with a storage plan but they've been just fine sitting there. I'll let everybody know how they do in the spring.
(post #14352, reply #6 of 10)
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They do fine, but it's really best to get slips going by setting the taters in a jar of water in a window sill. When the slips get to be about 4"-5" long, you break them off and bury them up to the last two inches in warm soil (crucial...if the outside soil isn't warm yet, then put them in potting soil indoors) and keep them watered. They'll root within three days. If you set taters out, better not try it till about June or you'll almost certainly end up with a nasty lump of stinky mush. One tater inside can make dozens of slips.
(post #14352, reply #7 of 10)
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Gretchen, did the black tater in the pot make it throught the winter? I've often wondred.
BJ The Gardeners Husband
(post #14352, reply #8 of 10)
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BJ, it's a tricolor and yes it's doing wonderfully, at least for being stuck in a buggy greenhouse in winter. It's put out one runner that's probably 8 feet long. Scott has it trained along the windowsills and it's sending vertical shoots off of it. I need to snip them off and make more for everyone as per Jeana's instructions above. The other little pot you had shriveled up and browned while we were out of town so I cut it back. It gives me the impression it may send up new shoots but it hasn't yet.
(post #14352, reply #9 of 10)
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I forgot it was a tricolor. Good. I hope that it has been a colorful winter pot. I think that the other pot had slips for rooting. I think that I would just toss it.
BJ
(post #14352, reply #10 of 10)
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Gretch, if you're nervous (which you shouldn't be with your speedling trays), you can also root your slips in water.