They seem to root equally well in water or soil (very well drained sand works better for me than a potting mix with a lot of humus or peat that holds a lot of moisture), so I am not sure it really matters either way.

However, I'm not sure I'd bother trying to overwinter sweet potato cuttings. I tried several different years to overwinter ornamental sweet potatoes in a sunny window, and they usually hang on until midwinter and then die. It is hard to get them enough sunlight and heat to keep them happy and late January to early February's lack of sunlight and heat is too much for them, even indoors. Nowadays I just dig up the ornamental sweet potatoes themselves, clip off the vines, and overwinter the potatoes in my pantry or tornado shelter. This works best if you dig the potatoes before they freeze. They sprout pretty quickly indoors in a pot with a well-drained mix in late March to early May, especially if I put a seedling heat mat underneath their container. I like to use a cactus potting mix to do this because it drains so well.

You also may find whiteflies to be an issue on overwintering sweet potatoes, especially if you have other houseplants that might be harboring the whiteflies.

Maybe George will have better advice than mine--but I just think overwintering sweet potato cuttings will be more trouble than it is worth. Just my two cents, and you can ignore it.

Overwintering cuttings won't even get your plants off to an earlier start next spring because you absolutely, positively cannot plant them until the soil is really, really, really warm. If you can keep the rooted cuttings alive, it will save you a few bucks in terms of not having to buy slips next year, but you also can just save a sweet potato or two in a dry, cool place like a tornado shelter, unheated basement, unheated closet or pantry, etc. and start slips in the spring and that will save you the expense of buying slips next spring without having to struggle to keep them alive all fall and winter.

Exactly. It would be much better to save a sweet potato or two and sprout your own slips in the spring. We just wrap them in newspaper and store them in a paper sack, somewhere where it doesn't get too cold. Last year I stored the sack on the bottom shelf of my planter, in the house.

George

Well, this is kind of an offbeat idea, but one of those things you might try.

When you dug your sweet potatoes, did they have long skinny little tuber-looking roots? If so, you might try leaving those in the soil. Cover them up well and maybe even add some mulch on top. Yes, everybody, I know, the cold winter is supposed to kill off any sweet potatoes left in the ground and freezing temps will stunt the growth in early spring. But if you have these little tubers and if you're not going to do anything with them anyway, what have you got to lose?

The reason I suggest this is that I just today dug sweet potatoes. I got four nice large ones. But I did not plant sweet potatoes this year, so these apparently came up from one of those little tuber-looking roots that got put into the compost. They're not even in the same bed as the ones I grew last year. Last year's sweet potato plants were from a grocery store sweet potato that sprouted, so there was nothing special there. I was surprised to see what I was sure were sweet potato leaves emerging there next to where I have beans planted, but I just left them there. Seems like they emerged kind of late. Today when I pulled away the vine, those sweet potatoes were just sticking their noses up out of the soil! How weird is that? I swear, there is no other way sweet potatoes could have gotten planted there that I can think of.

Gotta tell ya, my mouth is watering just thinking about sticking one of those in the microwave and giving it a few spins. Yum-O......

I think garden "surprises' like this are always fun.

I've had a lot of white potatoes sprout where I didn't think I planted any this year either. (I did have some taters there in that bed last year.) Maybe in rainier weather, dry and dormant tubers just sprout whereas they might not sprout in drier years.

I am hearing thunder again....here comes another band of rain.

Hm. Ok, well I had planned to keep them alive in my greenhouse but I suppose I could save space and just put the tubers in a cool part of the greenhouse, like on the floor by the door. I guess I didn't realize the ornamentals also made tubers. I'll just have to label them so I don't try to eat the ornamental tubers mid winter! Thanks everyone.

Is now a good time to dig them? I think we're supposed to get a light frost on monday or so, so I could dig them this weekend.

Three things pop out most for me from my blissful elementary school years in West Texas:

(1) practicing drills of hiding under our desks in case of an atomic bomb attack;
(2) planting a sweet potato with toothpicks on its side in a pickle jar.
(3) hearing "Crazy" (and lots of other songs) on the radio in the kitchen.

Obviously that was many, many years ago. I'm much older and wiser now.

I no longer practice protecting myself from atomic bombs by getting under a table and putting my hands over my head.

But, every fall and winter I start a sweet potato in a pickle jar and let it grow in a kitchen window. When the potato goes foul I just start a new one with fresh toothpicks. So, however you want to do it, know that sweet potato in a kitchen window in the winter is a great thing.

Oh, and sometimes I listen to "Crazy", too. Link is below.

Robert

Here is a link that might be useful: Crazy

You can dig them anytime they reach what you consider a usable size. I do like to get them dug well before a frost or freeze occurs. At the temperatures we're having, I doubt leaving them in the ground any longer is doing them much good.

The important thing is to dig them up before the soil temperature drops to 50 degrees because that is the soil temp at which chilling injury can occur, and chilling injury will give you roots that go bad more quickly in storage. I checked the Mesonet soil temp maps just a minute ago for 3-day-average soil temps and they still are in the upper 50s to mid 60s over most of the state, but a few very cold nights could change that pretty quickly. So, it probably is a good idea to dig them soon.

Robert, I remember the voice and the song, but I didn't remember those eyebrows. Those are a little scarey. LOL

Robert,

I remember the ridiculous drills. Even as a small child, I remember thinking "this isn't going to save us". LOL Maybe I am just a skeptical person by nature.

We always grew plants from avocado pits the same way you did the sweet potatoes.

I do remember "Crazy" although by the time I was old enough to pay attention to it, she was already dead. I was four when she died, but my dad liked her music so I heard it a lot growing up. I loved "Crazy" but also "I Fall To Pieces" and "Walkin' After Midnight". I agree with Carol about the scarey eyebrows. They just really dominate Patsy's face.

Now, what I'm really wondering is if you ever started a sweet potato plant while hiding under your desk at school during a drill while simultaneously listening to Patsy Cline sing "Crazy". THAT would have been quite an accomplishment.

I think we're all a little bit "Crazy" here, and if it rains all fall and winter, we'll be more than a little bit "Crazy" by spring.

Dawn

This forum never ceases to give new slants on many various subjects-like remembering to keep your eyebrows fashionably plucked. Now, everytime I see Patsy on video, my focus will be on her eyebrows.

This reminds me of when my DS told his friend, who'd been bragging about his new girlfriend's superior "looks", told him her smile looked like the joker. It completely deflated him, and he told my son he could never look at her again in quite the same way.

Barbara

When our youngest was a small boy he had this little girlfriend and he carried a picture of her in his wallet. My husband has a friend about his age that has never married and he was around our house quite a lot when the kids were small. He convinced DS to show him the girl's picture. It was sort of at the beginning of this wild hair craze and her hair was long and a little unruly. When Ken looked at the picture, the first words out of his mouth were, "Oh, Suzy Windtunnel". We have long forgotten the little girls name, but anytime we see a wild hair-do, someone says, "Oh, Suzy Windtunnel". Family traditions are made in the wildest ways sometimes. LOL

This has brought back some memories for me too.

I remember those drills, but I also remember living in California during coupon books, rationing and blackout shades. Back in Missouri, I remember waking to Lulu Belle and Scotty. We lived in a little honest to gosh log house with no running water or indoor plumbing. Milk was kept cold sunk into the icy water of the spring. We lived in a 'holler' surrounded by Ozark Mountains.

You think I might be the senior member here??????

Just the other day, my family was discussing the deer that were hanging out in the holler down the road. I don't think it's your age as much as how far into the sticks you grew up.

I dug up my eating potatoes and the ornamentals. The ornamental is the pathetic little pink root on the bottom. Do you think it might be better to do cuttings of the ornamental since I have greenhouse space?

Yes. If I was going to devote greenhouse space to something, I would choose the ornamental because it is the weakest-looking tater of the bunch.

However, I have had roots that size grow new plants when planted....if they make it through the winter. When they are that small, though, they often do shrivel up and wither away and don't make it through the winter in storage....so trying to carry over cuttings of the ornamental in the greenhouse is probably a good idea in case that little root doesn't survive the winter.

gldno1 - The lady that I took to Baker Creek last weekend told me a similar story about her childhood and how they kept their milk in a stream and it stayed so cold. She said their garden was well over an acre, and they raised hogs and smoked the meat and stored it in a smoke house in salt.

Not many of us would know how to survive without electricity today. I had a little trouble last power outage. LOL Actually we did fine....but after a few days, I was ready for it to be restored.

Tigerdawn is probably right, it probably isn't your age at all, just your circumstances. Bet you have some great stories.

I remember butchering hogs at grandma and grandpas. They sugar cured it and wrapped it in muslin and hung it from the rafters in the smokehouse. I think Grandpa smoked his too but I don't remember that.

I wouldn't want to go back to no electricity or running water!
We had 11 days of that with the bad ice storm....that was enough.

Tigerdawn, be aware that the sweet potatoes go really, really deep sometimes and that sometimes you'll find sweet potatoes as far as a foot or two away from where your hill was. You might have more potatoes if you feel around for them, so be sure to do that. Last year, I planted sweet potato cuttings and I was amazed how many huge ones I had by fall. They filled up the raised bed and clung to the inside walls, some of them even wedged themselves under the bottom inside edges and were really hard to dig.

I ate one of my volunteer sweet potatoes for lunch yesterday, practically right out of the ground. Wow, it was good! Just butter, salt and pepper was all it needed.