How early shall I start trying for sweet potato slips?

17 years ago

I have not had the opportunity to grow sweet potatoes in about 25 years, since we lived in southern Michigan. All of our travels finally have returned us to the wonderful Midwest in our retirement and I once more have a wonderful garden spot ready to go!

I remember that once I had got my sweet potato to start producing sprouts (using the time-honored method of placing the potato, supported by toothpicks, in a container of water), I would allow each sprout to get about 6" long, then remove it to another container of water to grow roots. I kept adding the slips to the second container until I had my desired number of slips for planting.

What I cannot recall is how early to start --or how long I should wait to put my potato in water. I am in central ohio, zone 5, and will be planting in raised beds (15"-18" deep) that are going to need to thaw out before planting. I'll pull off the chopped leaf/grass mulch & use black plastic to warm the soil as soon as things thaw enough (weeks yet!). But I do not want to exhaust my potatoes or have the slips become overgrown before time to plant.

Also, I currently have my "seed" potatoes (I bought a couple of healthy-looking organic potatoes from a Whole Foods store over the holidays)in a dark cellar with about 55% humidity and between 45-50 degrees. Is that too cool? And would it be better to store the potatoes in some barely damp spaghnum moss, sand, peat, or coir until ready to start them?

I'd appreciate any suggestions as to when to start propagating my taters! Many thanks in advance!

CK

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Comments (4)

yiorges-z5il
17 years ago
I start my sweet potatoes 10-14 days before I wish to set them out in my area I set them out around mothers day
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Preston Greenhouse
17 years ago
Sweet potatoes do not like cold ground. For this reason they should be planted after your soil temperatures have warmed up. planting them in raised beds with black plastic covering your beds will certainly help. Also selecting varieties that are early maturing varieties will allow you to plant a little later when the ground is warmer and still make a good crop. For rooted cuttings, 2 weeks or so will give them time to push out new roots. You may take your slips directly from the tubers or you can take tip cuttings from the vine tips. For rooted cuttings a 2" cutting with at least 2 nodes stuck in a half peat half perlite mix and put in a high humidity area under mist and preferably bottom heat. For unrooted cuttings your vine tip cuttings should contain at least 4 nodes (approximately 8-10" long) be sure to trim leaves back to a central stem. One thing to consider is that the tubers over several generations pick up viruses that affect your yields. For this reason all of our plants start out from tissue culture where they are screened for viruses.
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centerhill
17 years ago
gthumb.ky has excellent advice. I agree that it is best to buy sweet potato plants. You will be assured of getting better potatoes that are free from disease that way. If you really want to grow them yourself I would suggest you put your potato into the water suspended by the toothpicks (as you describe) about a month before your soil will get to 70 degrees, which is about the time most farmers plant corn. That should give you enough time to get the sprouts long enough to pull and root before planting. I have used water with fish emulsion as well as a light container growing medium with better results from the soil rooted cuttings.

As far as your regular potatoes go, 45-50 degrees is fine until about a month or so before planting...then move them to a warmer area and pre-sprout them. I put mine on my back porch which has glass windows and let them get some light, then when they start to sprout a little I put them in a brown bag for about a week before planting. Soil temperatures of 55 degrees is what I aim for before planting regular potatoes.
steve777
17 years ago
Along this same line...

I would like to give sweet potatoes a try this year, but it is a bit of a gamble in my area given how short our season is. So I would like to try just a couple of plants. I would like to start them myself from a store bought sweet potato, but I am not familiar enough with the varieties to be able to tell which one would be a short season one.

Any easy identifications for recognizing which sweet potato would be an early variety from the bins at a grocery store?

TIA