do you mean the field crop.. or the decorative vine???

if the vine.. just plant one.. and find out ... shade is a rather vague term... and if you think about it.. means little ... there is high bright shade.. low dense shade.. etc ...

what is actually in your yard is what matters.. and there is no way for any of us to know ...

i guess its not much different with the field crop ... but you should contact your county extention office.. for guidance on field crops in your county ... they may just tell you shade isnt really the issue ...

that said ... you dont see many farm fields.. with significant shade ... if that tells us anything ..

i am also curious if its not past potato planting time in FL ...

ken

In my garden in Central Florida you can plant sweet potatoes as an edible crop in different kinds of light more or less,of course they will do better in full sun. It is one of the very productive crops considering first your soil is good. Otherwise it will grow a lot of vines and no tubers.

You can plant anytime when the temperatures are warm, takes about 100 days to get a sweet potato crop.

Thanks I will try it. Do you notice rats or mice damage. Read that sweet pot attracts varmits.

It is past planting time. I am thinking next season garden prep. I was going to dig a small area and start incorporating org matter now.

I have grown a lot of sweet potato varieties through the years, the plain orange ones, the oriental ones, a lot of different kinds and never had problem with rats or mice. In my neighbors garden they were more attracted to the ripe star fruit, that is a problem when not picking ripe fruit.

The soil has to be good, otherwise you can get some chewing from bugs under ground.

Because I have small dogs, I usually go over any ground cover to see if anything is hiding like snakes, that can happen.

It's never too late to plant sweet potatoes, because the leaves are edible and delicious. I tried them here, but never got many potatoes because I have too many roots in my gardens, but I let them just come up every year so I can eat the leaves. Either way, it's a great plant. Try starting some slips from a store-bought plant and plant them as summer greens. If you don't snip the growing tips off, just harvest the leaves, you might even get a few potatoes.

Last year I put a budding sweet potato in a huge pot that is mostly in the shade... just because. I was quite surprised to find about a dozen good sized potatoes in that pot in the Fall.

OK CA.

Mice and voles can be very destructive. I trapped 16 or 17 last year with a trap at each end of the row....no damage.

Did you use regular mouse trap? At least you didn't get rats.