How to Plant a Purple Sweet Potato Vine
The sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas) is a perennial vine with dark purple leaves. It's only distantly related to the potato, and the tubers are an important food crop. The tubers are harvested in the fall and can be purple, red or yellow. The sweet potato is commonly grown on the border of a garden as ground cover and may also be grown in containers. Does this Spark an idea?
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Things You'll Need
- Sweet potato plants or cuttings
- Potting containers
- Peat moss
- Fertilizer
Instructions
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Examine your climate. The sweet potato requires a subtropical climate with only mild frosts. This limits its range to U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) hardiness zones 9 and 10.
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Take cuttings of a mature sweet potato vine just before the first frost. Grow the cuttings in a southern window and allow them to take root in a soil-less medium such as peat moss. You can also transplant new plants.
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Prepare the site. Sweet potatoes can grow in full sun with at least six hours of direct sun but are also tolerant of shade. The soil should have a neutral pH around 7 and have good drainage. You can improve the quality of the soil with aged compost or manure.
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Plant the rooted cuttings or new plants in spring after the last frost. Put them at the same depth that they were in the container and space them according to their mature spread. This depends on the particular variety of sweet potato and could vary from 6 inches to 2 feet. Water the plants thoroughly and provide mulch to retain moisture if necessary.
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Maintain the sweet potato vines. Keep the soil moist during the growing season, although you can allow the surface to dry between waterings for plants in containers. Apply a balanced, water-soluble fertilizer each week if possible. Remove any discolored leaves for cosmetic purposes.
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