Really want to try to grow our own organic version. Felt encouraged by the reviews that it is easy to grow and the thought of barbecued and tempura sweet potato is too attractive. The leaves are edible too - perfect when stir fried with dried shrimp and chilli paste!
I got two varieties - Japanese and Vietnamese. Could not find organic versions, so made do with these 2.
I halved the roots and placed them cut-side down in tea cups. The roots were left by a window sill with a couple of hours of direct sunlight. Water level is kept to about an inch from the base of the sweet potato.
The water is changed once every couple of days. I change because it starts to smell fermented. Changing the water helps.
After 7-10 days nothing happens. The Japanese variety started to go bad - soft and mushy. So I chucked them. The Vietnamese varieties went slightly pale at the portions that were soaked in water. Apart from that, they stayed very much the same - but firm.
By the end of the second week, roots started to appear and 4-5 days later, tiny shoots appeared. Once the shoots formed, the slips grew quickly. These slips are about 3-4 days old.
I noticed that the slips that receive more sunlight grow faster.
This half is skinnier. It rooted faster and formed shoots faster. However, the slips grew slower. This cup gets slightly less sunlight - so it could be a factor.
This half is fleshier. It was 3-4 days slower when rooting and forming shoots. However, the slips grew taller and leaves bigger more quickly. Do note that this cup received slightly more sunlight.
I am waiting for roots to form at the slips before potting some. Will keep this space posted.
Update 6 July 2015:
After 2 weeks of soaking the halved sweet potato in water, the slips have grown to about 15cm.
I selected a few slips that were stronger and had some roots attached. Carefully removed them from the tuber. To be sure, I rooted the slips in water first. It took about 3-4 days to develop a heathy root system. By then the slips have grown to about 20cm long. I then potted the slips with roots in soil.
A week after potting, the plant has grown to about 30cm vertically.
They have been growing well in a sunny spot since, but have started to develop horizontally.
I have 3 plants in this pot. The plant to the left has been potted for the longest. I am in the process of setting up raised beds for the edibles. These ones would be allowed to climb horizontally and upwards. Hope it works!
Experimenting with the sweet potatoes.
We tried harvesting some of the sweet potato leaves from this variety. Not impressive as the stems are tough.
So I am trying to root them in a bag. There different schools of thoughts on how to produce sweet potato tubers.
Key pointers include:
1. Try not to trim leaves, if you want to produce tubers.
2. Avoid fertilisers with more Nitrogen (N) as those promote leaf growth.
3. Avoid watering too intensively when you think the plants are ready to put out tubers - the draught scenario tricks the plant into storing food and producing more tubers.
So I repotted the 3 long plants in a sack which I folded back. I fill it up with garden soil and just wait. Read somewhere that burnt soil might work better. So if I need to eventually fill up the sack, I would add burnt soil instead.
The longest plant, has been trimmed. I placed it at the back, with feeble attempts to bury the stem as I coil it upwards. At the bottom left, the slip has also been trimmed. I buried the stem as deeply as I can. At the bottom right, the slip has not been trimmed. I also buried the stem as deeply as I can.
Now I wait for the leaves to die back. Hopefully, we can yield some results or at least lessons to be learnt.
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