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Post by walt on Jul 2, 2018 15:40:04 GMT -5
My volunteer sweet potato seedlings have flower buds close to blooming.
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Post by walt on Jul 18, 2018 13:11:42 GMT -5
Could seedling sweet potatoes become weeds? In my dreams. But this morning I noticed a sweet potato seedling in my wife's cannas. That is 10 m. from where the parents grew last year. But that 10 m. is paved, so maybe a seed fell from the 20 gallon pot that had all my seedling last year. And the pot was on the pavement. And there is a slight slope toward the canna bed. So rain could have taken the seed there.
The seedling is a nice purple with cut leaves. My wife may want to keep it. I guess she can have one.
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Post by reed on Jul 19, 2018 5:46:40 GMT -5
They are still coming up here and there in my garden. I'v kept a few including a couple that only sprouted recently to see if they have time to mature enough to make seeds and good sized roots. If they do then maybe there is no need to get in a hurry starting plants in spring. Maybe May or even June is soon enough, eliminating the hassle of messing with them while it's still cold.
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Post by walt on Jul 19, 2018 10:57:21 GMT -5
I eagerly await our results. Of course my growing season might be a month longer than yours.
But my sweet potatoes' genetics might not be as good as yours. You have selected for a generation or more. I have grown every seed I have seen, but my population has been so small I've had to save every seed from every plant. No selection at all.
Next year I'll get some different varieties to add to mine. I think I can get usable roots first year from seed. But maybe not with what I have.
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Post by walt on Jul 19, 2018 11:00:13 GMT -5
I just finished reading book, fiction, about Seminiles in the Florida Everglades. In it, it is mentioned that they ate roots of a wild, red-flowered morning glory. Anyone heard of such?
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Post by reed on Jul 19, 2018 21:35:22 GMT -5
I eagerly await our results. Of course my growing season might be a month longer than yours. But my sweet potatoes' genetics might not be as good as yours. You have selected for a generation or more. I have grown every seed I have seen, but my population has been so small I've had to save every seed from every plant. No selection at all. Next year I'll get some different varieties to add to mine. I think I can get usable roots first year from seed. But maybe not with what I have. O' usable roots from seed is most definitely possible and with the purple ornamental as either female or male parent. But, at least from what I'v seen the ornamental selfed yields just little stringy roots. I don't keep the best records but from all the plants last year I'd guess close to 50% yielded usable roots. Maybe 10% yielded usable roots and seeds and 2% (one plant) yielded sweet orange roots and seeds. Other nice orange root plants yielded no seeds. Since most of mine are from those best of the best of last year I'm really looking forward to seeing their roots. One thing is so far this year is only one plant has been culled for poor vigor and lack of flowers. [add] Correction, actually I think the number of seed grown that had usable roots was higher than that, only a few really had the stringy little roots. It's just that more experimentation is needed in the kitchen to find out how to use the less sweet ones. Where I'm from culturally, if it ain't orange and sweet it ain't a sweet potato. |
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Post by walt on Jul 20, 2018 13:34:42 GMT -5
Yes, knowing how to use a given sweet potato matters.
Decades ago, the first time I went to the Seed Savers camp out, I heard people talking about sweet potato varieties as bakers, pie type, and salad type. I didn't interupt and ask what was meant as a salad type sweet potato, and I still don't know. If I by chance came up with a salad type, would I know it? Or would I throw it out as worthless?
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Post by Joseph Lofthouse on Jul 22, 2018 21:37:13 GMT -5
I heard people talking about sweet potato varieties as bakers, pie type, and salad type. I didn't interupt and ask what was meant as a salad type sweet potato, and I still don't know. If I by chance came up with a salad type, would I know it? Or would I throw it out as worthless? I wonder if "salad type" was meant to imply that the leaves are eaten, rather than the tubers? |
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Post by reed on Jul 23, 2018 7:56:58 GMT -5
Around here the most common way I'v know people to eat sweet potatoes is baked, generally with butter and brown sugar added, I prefer maple syrup. I have also had sweet potato pie, which I think was made very similar to pumpkin pie or at least cause of the spices added tasted like pumpkin pie which is not a favorite of mine. Jury is still out for me on if I like the leaves or not, some are better than others.
I experimented a little and plan to a lot more using them like regular potatoes. Fried with onions, baked with garlic and butter, chunked up in beef stew or vegetable soup, actually already tried the soup and they were very fine that way.
Besides color and sweetness there is variation in texture, some are kind of stringy and some for lack of a better word are spongy. The spongy ones especially are very off putting to me even if the flavor is good.
Over all I'm starting to think they are superior to potatoes as a sustainable food crop. Easier to grow, more productive, easier to store, stores much longer, from what I understand more nutritious and last but not least they are vastly easier to get true seeds.
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Post by walt on Jul 23, 2018 13:03:09 GMT -5
I heard people talking about sweet potato varieties as bakers, pie type, and salad type. I didn't interupt and ask what was meant as a salad type sweet potato, and I still don't know. If I by chance came up with a salad type, would I know it? Or would I throw it out as worthless? I wonder if "salad type" was meant to imply that the leaves are eaten, rather than the tubers? I hadn't thought of that, though I've eaten the leaves often in stir frys. I had thought maybe they used it like potatoes in potato salad. Don't know. But the purple leaves on mine would look good in a salad. Thanks for the idea. |
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Post by richardw on Jul 23, 2018 15:12:46 GMT -5
Over all I'm starting to think they are superior to potatoes as a sustainable food crop. Easier to grow, more productive, easier to store, stores much longer, from what I understand more nutritious and last but not least they are vastly easier to get true seeds. I like the sound of that!, That is certainly not the case with the NZ Kumara clones that need at least 150 frost free days even before they start to grow a reasonable crop of tubers. Stores longer? depends on the potato variety, be hard to beat the Moie moie potato that i grow that if 'rubbed' we can still be eating up to late spring when the new spuds are coming on. |
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Post by reed on Jul 24, 2018 8:44:38 GMT -5
richardw , Do the Moie moie potatoes store fine at room temperature? Can you make enough clones to plant 50 feet of row from just two or three stored potatoes? Will they keep good in a box under the stairs a few feet from the wood stove, or in trays under the storage bench in the kitchen, or in an old chest of drawers in the spare room upstairs? Can you grow them in the kitchen window and eat the greens fresh all winter and then chop up the plants and set them out? Do they have pretty flowers and make seeds, each one of which is a unique new kind? If the answer to even one of those questions is yes, then I want some. 
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Post by Walk on Jul 24, 2018 11:36:10 GMT -5
Over all I'm starting to think they are superior to potatoes as a sustainable food crop. Easier to grow, more productive, easier to store, stores much longer, from what I understand more nutritious and last but not least they are vastly easier to get true seeds. I like the sound of that!, That is certainly not the case with the NZ Kumara clones that need at least 150 frost free days even before they start to grow a reasonable crop of tubers. Stores longer? depends on the potato variety, be hard to beat the Moie moie potato that i grow that if 'rubbed' we can still be eating up to late spring when the new spuds are coming on. We are still eating sweet potatoes from last year's harvest. I thought this was noteworthy until I talked to a friend in Wisconsin who about a month ago ate the last sweet potatoes from the 2016 harvest. I was a picture of the sliced open tuber and it was still in really good condition with almost no sprouting. I don't know what variety it was but it may have been Georgia Jet as I know that's what she has grown in the past. |
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Post by philagardener on Jul 24, 2018 19:07:02 GMT -5
We are still eating sweet potatoes from last year's harvest. I thought this was noteworthy until I talked to a friend in Wisconsin who about a month ago ate the last sweet potatoes from the 2016 harvest. I was a picture of the sliced open tuber and it was still in really good condition with almost no sprouting. I don't know what variety it was but it may have been Georgia Jet as I know that's what she has grown in the past. I'm just finishing up last year's harvest and they are still in great shape! I did have some sprouting but dug them so late last year that it was hard to get enough warmth to cure them properly. |
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Post by richardw on Jul 24, 2018 23:11:18 GMT -5
Wow, i didnt know they would last that long, i'll take my words back then. This is even more reason for me to get into growing open pollinate sweet potato.
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