A combination of over a decade of experience and ideal storage and slip-starting conditions in Lisa’s basement have led us to pretty reliable success with growing our own slips from the previous year’s sweet potato crop. (See The Great Sweet Potato Experiment by Lisa for more on that.)
The process began on April 12. We currently grow three types: standard (originally from Beauregard and Georgia Jet tubers), Murasaki (a Japanese type), and Purple (from tubers donated by Daphne Gould of Daphne’s Dandelions). The purple sweet potato slips were slow this year, and needed to be put under lights for additional warmth to begin producing.
The sweet potatoes were harvested yesterday, upon the discovery of exploratory digging in the bed by the local wildlife. It was a joint effort, starting with Celia and me, with David adding as much work as the two of us combined. We harvested a total of 29.25 pounds of tubers from our 36 square foot plot, or 0.8#/sf. Below are the detailed results of the harvest, with thanks to Carol and Suzy for their careful documentation.
Standard (18sf)
12 plants produced 19.6# = 1.6#/plant
Murasaki (12sf)
8 plants produced 5.4# = 0.7#/plant
Purple (6sf)
4 plants produced 4.25# = 1.1#/plant
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