North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[athagan@atlantic.net]

If the plants are more than a foot or so long don't fertilize them
anymore or you'll get lots of vines and not many spuds.

.....Alan.

Quoting Charles Paradise <machelp@attglobal.net>:

> Decided to coddle one of the sweet potato vines, put a circular
> hardware cloth around it, fertilized it with foliar and watered
> with Mir-Acid soluble fertilizer and dug in granular fertilizer. 
> After this special attention, and rain, the plant after only 5 days
> has doubled in size while others in its row has dwindled while they
> have continued to be eaten by the rabbit.
> 
> I'll  coddle this one vine through this August and September New
> England season - if it can produce then next year I will grow sweet
> potato again in a manner like pole beans are raised in New England,
> which is with as described above [hardware cloth + pole].  I'll let
> you know Oct. 1 how its doing.  I'm encouraged by its revival and
> lusterous appearance but if I'd coddled it earlier it would be much
> further along now.  Thanks for your thoughts on sweet potoatoes on
> the north and proposal to grow them on a pole.
> Charlie Paradise  'too experimental' in z5 Massachusetts
> 
> >
> > > I've had rabbits eat my sweet potato vines from time to time,
> but
> > > they've never managed to do any significant damage once they
> really
> > > take off when the weather turns hot.
> >
> > I've had deer take all the leaves off. Now that did do damage to
> the
> > crop.
> >
> > > If you're going to be growing these things in New England it
> would
> > > seem to me that growing season is going to be your biggest
> concern as
> > > sweet potatoes are tropical in nature.  They don't like cool
> weather
> > > much and a light frost will kill the vines dead.  There are
> several
> > > varieties reputed to produce good tubers in ninety days.
> >
> > Planting in plastic mulch (to warm the soil early in the season)
> also
> > helps in the North.
> > >
> > > Steele Plant Co. in Tennessee carries a nice selection of
> plants.  May
> > > be a bit too late in the season for you by now though.
> >
> > Much too late. Here they need to go in by early June. You might
> get
> > away with putting them in a bit earlier under row covers.
> >
> > I don't know anything about growing them up a pole, though. They
> do
> > need a lot of room, sprawled all over the ground.
> 
> _______________________________________________
> nafex mailing list 
> nafex@lists.ibiblio.org
> 
> **YOU MUST BE SUBSCRIBED TO POST!**
> All other messages are discarded.
> No exceptions.  
> ----
> To subscribe or unsubscribe, go to the bottom of this page (also
> can be used to change other email options):
> http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/nafex
> 
> File attachments are NOT stripped by this list
> TAKE STEPS TO PROTECT YOURSELF FROM COMPUTER VIRUSES!
> Please do not send binary files.
> Use plain text ONLY in emails!
> 
> Message archives are here:
> https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/nafex
> 
> NAFEX web site:   http://www.nafex.org/
> 




-------------------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent through Atlantic.Net Webmail.                           
  
Sick of pop-up ads and climbing prices?                                       
  
Visit www.atlantic.net to get pure Internet for $19.95/mo.