I'm going to try growing sweet potatoes in New Hampshire. I know that won't seem like much of a task for those folks in North Carolina, but for those of us who live in the land of rocks and frost it's not so easy. I'm looking out at a field covered with 1½ feet of snow and the possibility that sweet potatoes will grow there seems remote. Anyway, I've ordered Beauregard and Covington slips which should arrive in early June, read available information from local sources, and now thought I'd ask the folks here if they have had success raising sweet potatoes in a cold climate.
The local sources (Maine and New Hampshire) stressed the use of black plastic to raise bed temperatures prior to planting, and the need for fencing if deer were a problem as they loved sweet potatoes. The consensus picks were the Beauregard and the Covington; has anyone had good luck with another variety?
Growing sweet potatoes in northern New England
Beauregard is a good growing orange and O'Henry [Henry Field] is a very good growing and early yellow [my favorite]. Ridge the rows up neary a foot high and use black plastic. Sweetpotatoes are a breeze here in the north. They were huge by late August from a late May planting.
Wow, I will be watching for your followups, jhwentworth. I was sorely tempted to try growing sweet potatoes this year myself. I love them more than regular potatoes, but usually the store does not have the organic ones. It would be great to grow them myself.
Thank you Indy for your advice. I looked at several varieties and picked two that seemed most reliable here in a 4b/5a area. I bought my slips from George's Plant Farm and they should be delivered in June. It still seems strange to be talking about sweet potatoes in New Hampshire.
The bonus of growing sweetpotato plants (Ipomoea batatas) is that the leaves of the vine are tasty and nutritious. See the nutritional breakdown by the USDA at http://www.recipetips.com/usda/food-nutrition/t--11874/sweet-potato-leaves-cooked-steamed-with-salt.asp. Wait until the plants are well-established before harvesting any leaves.
Some recipes from the southern states of the U.S.A. specify lightly sauteing the young leaves in oil and adding garlic. Be sure to use young, tender leaves -- and remove any stems that are tough. The international market near me in Maryland charges $2.00 per pound for the leaves -- apparently they are very popular in a number of ethnic cuisines.
You will like the slips that you get from George's Plant Farm. Mine arrived Sat., May 9, 2009. They are all in great shape. I'm growing Beauregard and Bunch Porto Rico for the first time, Japanese Red for the second time, and Vardaman for the third time. Vardaman is a truly beautiful plant, with ornamental landscape value. Japanese Red sweetpotatoes have a texture that is unique. The texture is very light, fluffy, and drier than the texture of a standard sweet potato -- but with a very fine grain. If your soil conditions are favorable for Japanese Red, and if you are interested in trying this cultivar, call George's Plant Farm to see if it can be added to your June order.
Since your growing season is so short, you will need to be extra careful to harvest the sweetpotatoes before nighttime temperature become cold in the autumn -- otherwise the roots will not store well. For ease of harvesting as well as for as root development, I recommend planting the slips in raised beds.
Good luck!
I didn't know the leaves were edible - thanks for the info Kitchengarden! My dog loves the cooked sweet potato skins - nothing goes to waste around here!
I'll second the "make a high ridge" advice. I planted mine just in the flat ground last year, and had a difficult harvest. Too many got skewered by the pitchfork! So I plan on making a long ridge and then planting the slips into one side.
Be sure to cure them in a warm spot for a few weeks. I left mine spread out on a table in my furnance room in the basement (ambient temps around 70 degrees) and today I still have a few firm ones left. Amazing!
I grew sweet potatoes in zone 4 last year and they did great. I had a problem with squirrels and chipmunks eating the tops of the tubers. This year I hope to have them covered with more dirt. Those critters ate 1/4 of my crop! Lastly, I planted Beauregard and Porto Rico. The one with the orange skin didn't store well and the one with the red skin stored beautifully. Does anyone know which of the two varieties have red skin?
Go to George's Plant Farm at http://www.tatorman.com/ and check out the links to the respective sweetpotato cultivars. The selection includes descriptions and photos of whole & cut roots of Beauregard, Georgia Jet, Vardaman, Centennial, Bunch (or Bush) Porto Rico, Nancy Hall, White Triumph, Carolina Ruby, Japanese Red, Covington, O'Henry, and Red Nuggett.
Good luck!
Sweet potatoes can be grown in Canada so I'm sure peeps in the Northern States wouldn't have any problems. However they certainly aren't a main crop here (we still get our store bought ones from Georgia......I checked the stickers FarmerDill). ;D
Here's a partial quote from this site: http://www.icangarden.com/document.cfm?task=viewdetail&itemid=3232
He also notes that amateur gardeners in what he calls “The Tough Zone” also have a modicum of success with sweet potatoes. This zone includes Newfoundland, northern Quebec, northern Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and northern British Columbia. At the time of writing his book he says Marie Coultis of Calgary had a successful crop in just one out of three years, but that she was going to persevere.
One of the ‘tricks’ he suggests for those in the tough zone is the use of soil-warming plastic, but not just the clear or black types commonly available. In warmer regions, the use of black plastic usually works slightly better than clear. The further north you go, as soil warming becomes more important, he says, “clear plastic outyields black. However, IRT (InfraRed Transparent) plastic incorporates some of the advantages of both kinds of plastic and is little more expensive when purchased in quantity.”
I'm pretty sure using the plastic they are talking about above I'd have no problem growing Sweet Potatoes here (in what can feel like the arctic tundra some years ;). I've grown many a plant (esp long season squash). that shouldn't make it to maturity in my zone, using clear plastic to warm up the soil (but will now experiment with the IRT to see if it shows even greater benefits). Calgary, I should mention, tends to get much cooler summer temps than my location however.
This message was edited May 13, 2009 10:51 PM
Beauregard, which matures in 90-95 days is grown in the Maritime provinces (a shorter season variety).
For those in lower zones in the States that are interested in growing them I found this:
Page 1
How sweet it is: Growing short-season sweet potatoes
by Greg Wingate
IF PEOPLE HAD TOLD ME SEVENTEEN YEARS AGO THAT YOU COULD GROW
SWEETPOTATOES IN CANADA, I'D HAVE THOUGHT THEY WERE PULLING MY LEG.
At the time, my gardening mindset placed sweet spuds just this side of pineapples and
bananas—way out of range for Maritime gardeners. After all, didn’t supermarket
sweetpotatoes hail from places like Louisiana and Tennessee?
But in 1985 an article by a New England gardener caught my eye. The author
explained how she’d been easily raising sweetpotatoes for years and that trials at Cornell
University in upstate New York showed some promising new short-season varieties. I
couldn’t resist trying them out for myself and have been happily growing sweetpotatoes
ever since. http://74.125.95.132/search?q=cache:tE5Mq0drQ40J:www.cog.ca/documents/Howsweetitis.pdf+%22sweet+potatoes%22+%2B+Canada&cd=41&hl=en&ct=clnk
I'd be tempted to contact Cornell University to see which varieties they found grew the best.
Lilypon, thanks for the link. I found out that sweet potatoes like a slightly acid soil pH 5.0–6.5 - which is exactly what I have! Also, I thought it was my imagination that they got sweeter in storage - now I know it wasn't.
Gee, I'd love to know the names of these new varieties. Any ideas of how to contact the right department to find out?
HoneybeeNC we picked up a few Sweet Potatoes in February and I fell in love with them.....up till now I have mainly eaten them in our New Year's day casserole (you know the one with orange juice and marshmallows). This time we nuked them in their skins and added just a bit of butter. I couldn't get over how sweet they were and I must admit I'd gladly give up regular taters to have them every day.
realVermonter the ones they suggest may be ones that members already listed above (I saw those posts after I posted mine) but I'm guessing it is the Cornell University Agriculture Experimental Station http://www.cuaes.cornell.edu/cals/cuaes/about/index.cfm that may be able to help you. Here's their contact info:
Address:
Cornell University Agricultural Experiment Station
240 Roberts Hall
Ithaca, NY 14853
Phone: 607-255-2552
Email: CUAESreception@cornell.edu
This message was edited May 14, 2009 9:49 PM
Lilypon - I always nuke sweet potatoes in the microwave 'cause it's the quickest way I've found to cook them. I just add a little salt, pepper, stevia (a sugar substitute) and sometimes a little cardamon for flavor. I have to keep to a low-carb/ sugar free diet.
Over the weekend, hubby and I laid down cardboard and covered it with leaves so our sweet potatoes and melons can roam to their hearts content. I am amazed how hardy the slips are - they are already putting out new leaves.
IMHO sweet potatoes are best baked in their skins in the regular oven. When they're done you leave them set a few minutes and the skin puffs up from the steam and comes off very easily and cleanly. The best results is to rub oil on the skins to keep them supple. They're easiest to peel when first baked and can be kept in the fridge for several days as a quick side dish at another time. They also freeze well once baked. Most Southerners would ask why anyone would make a pumpkin pie when they could have sweet potato pie instead.
jhwentworth Next Year start your own slips by puting a sweet tater in water do one or to. after the slips start growing put theam in a glass with water to root takes but a few days. then transplant your slips to starfoamcoffee cups with a good growing medum when its warm enough plant out side in the cup just cut the bottom off dont distrub the roots this way you will be ahead of the growing seson by a month Paul
Thank you for the lovely directions re different ways of cooking the sweet potatoes HoneybeeNC and Twiggybuds. :o) I read your suggestions earlier, just before we went out to buy our groceries, and now I've got a couple in the kitchen.
Last evening I got out my harvesting basket, and to my surprise there were a few very wrinkled sweet potatoes in the bottom which I thought my hubby had thrown out at the end of last season. Some of them had slips growing - so I put the potatoes in some water and will set the slips this weekend.
In revisiting this thread I'm glad to see that I'm not the only person foolish enough to grow sweet potatoes above the 42'nd parallel. I orders a few Beauregards from Johnny's Selected Seeds and 50 Covingtons from George's Plants. I have to say the slips from George's Plants were the better of the two groups, and they delivered 64 slips to fill my 50 slip order. Anyway, the Beauregard were planted a week ago and are already showing signs of life. I've taken a couple to plant in large pots as a decorative vine, and told inquisitive friends that they are a rare, and expensive, tropical exotic suitable only for master gardeners. I do wish I spoke Latin so I could come up with a really exotic name for them; "Ipomoea batatas" just doesn't convey the image I'm looking for to work this scam. Batatas just sounds too much like potatoes. Actually, the sweet potato is a relative of morning glories, so the decorative vine role does make some sense.
Phicks: Thanks for the info on growing slips. That might be something that I try if it's as easy as you describe.
Lilypon: Hearing that a gardener at the 50'th parallel has been successful gives me hope.
I think that all the plant suppliers ship sweet potatoes for growers in the north. I had been trying to get slips delivered to Texas since sometime in April. They finally delivered June 1! I planted anyway, since they should be able to stand the heat, but I'd hoped to get them in the ground before we hit 100-degree weather every day. Good luck!
David
Kitchengarden, I just picked up Georgia Jets and Vardamans. I'm a first time grower in south Houston. Couldn't get em out today so stored in a brown bag in the fridge. Planning on growing under leaves. There's a whole thread on the veggie forum discussing this technique. I have a question re the use of compost. I have a small flowerbed filled with aged homemade compost and leaves. My plan is to mound up some more aged, sifted compost to set my slips (only 3 of each) on. This should be ok, right? Then I'll cover with leaves as the vines start creeping. I'm putting a wire cage around the bed to contain the leaf mounding. LMK. Thanks. Linda
I am very interestedin following this thread, being originally from Massachusetts. I have grown Beauregard and ? Rico and they did well here. This year I planted 130 plants Beauregard and Georgia Jet. They have been in for about 3 weeks now and doing very well. I read that they like fish emulsion fertilizer and since my farm is certified naturally grown I used some and boy did they love it!.
Keep us posted on how they do in the NE, I would love to know.
Happy Gardening,
Susan
Susan,
What's your fish emulsion recipe, and how often do you use it? Also, what medium did you plant your slips in? What do you think mine'll do in a mound of yr-old homemade compost?
I use 4-2-4, that I got from Wood Creelk Farm in VA. They have a web site and will ship. Their products are great. I use it every 2 weeks for about 4 weeks after I plant the slips.
I would think yours would do well in compost as long as it is not too "hot". I just plant them in the garden in soil that we have ammended alot over the years. I plant in rows that I have hilled and then as they get bigger I pull more soil up along the rows, so they have room to grow.
It seems to me that sweetpotatoes really take off well whether I feed them much or not.
sweet taters grow well in poor soil
I thought I'd post an update on my success with sweet potatoes in New Hampshire, but there isn't much success to report. In northern New England the months of June and July were cold and wet, with standing water in sections of my garden. The only really successful plants are a couple that I've raised in pots where I could control water and temperature. I'll try again next year and hope our weather is more like North Carolina than like the North Pole.
JH,
Try raised beds next year, that helps with the water issue.
That sounds like good advice, Susan. Another lesson learned is to put the black plastic down earlier. Still, I'm afraid that another summer like this one will produce similar results for my sweet potato experiment. On the other hand, I have cabbages the size of basketballs, heavy production of cucumbers, and an amazing harvest of string beans, yellow beans, and pole beans. At some point there might be a substantial crop of tomatoes, if they ever ripen. If not? Anyone for fried green tomatoes?
I've been complaining about the rain, but did you read about the typhoon that hit Taiwan? It dumped 80" of rain. I guess I really didn't get all that much water this summer.
JH,
I usually ripen the tomatoes in the house cause birds eat them just as they ripen nicely. We lost all our Spring crops except beets due to too much rain then we went into a mini drought and have had no rain for ages. I just planted limas and beets and butternut squash but have to keep the sprinklers on them to keep them healthy till we get rain again.
This week I am putting brocc and cabbage in for Fall and many different greens.
I am not as north as you down here in Connecticut (don't get to say that too often) but the weather craziness was similar. My sweet potatoes don't really start jamming until the august heat and should blossom in a week or so. keep on watching them grow. I believe there are some people who grow them in Canada.
-joe-
I just discovered the blooms on mine this last week. The first time I grew them I dug them up before they gave flowers. :0. This time I am leaving them in for about 3 weeks after they bloom.
After a couple weeks of hot weather the sweet potatoes seem to have gained a bit of life. The vines are now about two feet long, so it's a race against the clock because a hard frost can't be all that far away. There were scattered frosts in our north country last week.
We dug our regular potatoes today and I was disappointed in the quantity and size of the crop. The reds were good-sized but few, the russets were many but small, and the Kennebecs were the best performers with good quantity and size.
our red Pontiacs were plentiful but a little small - we had blossoms starting on the sweet potatoes 2 weeks ago, not many - but they are still blossoming. I think they will be fine. I am concerned that our nights have been in the low 50's. I am glad to see that it really can be done up there in NH. Can't wait to see how they look when you dig them up in a month.. when is your first frost?
Our average first frost date in the Concord, NH area is around September 8'th, so you can see that the odds are long that I'll see very much production from the sweet potatoes. Oh well, lessons were learned for next year. (1) Much earlier preparation of the soil and installation of the black plastic. (2) Hill the soil prior to planting to avoid excess water. (3) Pray for sun.
You said that you were concerned that nights were in the 50's in Connecticut, well, we're in the 40's and that has put a halt on the warm weather crops. We were spoiled over the past few years with warm weather stretching into October, and that may not happen this year.
jhwentworth, last year I put a season extender cover a.k.a. garden blankie over mine. It really helped since it was only the nights that were too cold.
Good luck,
Donna
I'm sorry if i missed it in the thread somewhere - did your sweet potatoes blossom yet? - if not the row cover is an excellent idea.. you will have them either way, but after the blossom is the best harvest time.
-joe-
If your question is directed at me, I've had some blossoms but not alot. I'm still hoping for some decent weather. Our first frost date is projected October 15th-20th. I have my fingers crossed.
Last year when I used the row cover, yes they had blossomed. I didn't dig until Thanksgiving week.
Donna
Do sweet potatoes need to blossom? My neighbor's did, but mine haven't. I've dug several "hills" and the tubers are huge and have a very good flavor. Sweet potatoes are perennials here, these have been in the ground since some time in April or May.
Here is a photo of the plants.
