People who need small quantities have given good reviews to Sand Hill. I plant 500 per year so varieties at a good price are short. I do Beauregard and have also tried Georgia Jet. I plant the first week in June into black plastic with drip tape and use a bulb planter with trigger to make the hole, drop the plant, drop the soil plug on the plant. Not too fancy. I cover with row cover all summer to keep deer from eating the vines. I plant close together to avoid big tubers but I still get some. I do every foot, staggered three rows together in a bed and then let them vine. So in 165-170 feet and about 8 feet wide I put in 500 plants down three rows in the center.

I live deep in South Minneapolis; so deer are no issue here. I think Beauregard did pretty well for me last year. I have something a grand total of 500 to 600 square feet to play with; so space conservation is a real concern.

My mother and her younger brother both grew sweet potatoes back in NW Iowa, one saying to just plant in rows, the other saying you had to have them in hills. Both successful, too, but honestly regular potatoes were our staple and we grew a lot of them. I intend to get the landscape fabric this week, but with 3-5" of snow forecast, it will be a while before I can put that down. Back when I was doing landscaping I got to really liking the fabric over black plastic, I think I will be using a three foot wide bed of it for tomatoes and peppers too, not just sweet potatoes.

The sweet potato varieties I decided on were Wilma's (that's my mother's name - sorta sentimental), Patriot (I want to see the flowers) and Amish Bush Puerto Rico. That's a grand total of 15 plants and that will be about all I have space for. All of them are early and bush or semi-bush. I hope to be able to save back my own tubers for starting in future years. So we shall see...