Simply to get them sprouting requires one main ingredient... heat. One could get them started in the dark. But why not use light and have nice green slips from the get go?! Here are some tips I recently wrote out for someone who was requesting a variety from me: 1. Keep them warm! This is most important with this crop. If at all possible take a gander at Sandhill Preservation Center's web page on sweet potatoes. They have the absolute best information out there. 2. Keep them warm and moist while sprouting. Until the sprouts are over an inch long, you don't even need light. But you DO need heat in order to get them to sprout. 3. When the sprouts are about 5 or 6" long you can break them off the sweet potato and root them. They actually root in as little as 3-5 days! But the only reason one would want to root the cuttings is to encourage the root to sprout some more. I prefer to plant my slips with few or no roots on them at all. I just make sure they get watered, after planting, and they root on their own. 4.Only set out your slips (cuttings) when your outdoor temperatures (especially nights) are stable and not at all cool. I'd say that 55 F. is about as cool as you want to go. If you should have them planted and even have a light frost (heaven forbid) they will probably survive. But they may grow more slowly after being chilled. My theory is that the sweet potatoes grow from the first roots to form off of the slip. If those first roots are chilled, then they may grow much more slowly and end up being smaller, than if they grow under optimal conditions. Glenn Drowns says that he can plant his sweet potatoes in late June, in Iowa, and they often produce as well or better than those set out in May. This is because the earlier planting is often exposed to a couple of days of cold chilly rain. 5. I don't believe that sweet potatoes require a lot of fertilizer or soil amendments. If you want, you an put down a little compost, right where you're planning to plant them. But this isn't all that necessary. 6.The best way I know, to plant sweet potatoes, is to mark out where you want your row, and then dig down one side of that line and up the other side, piling the soil on that line. This makes a nice high hill, about a eight inches tall. One plants the slips right on the top of this ridge. The slips, being at the top of the hill (ridge) must send down roots to pursue moisture. These are the roots which develop into sweet potatoes. Plant your slips about 18" apart. I use a Korean hand hoe (homi), but even a good stick would work to make a hole and slip that slip down, as far as you can, so that only the very top leaves are sticking out of the hole. I slide them down, on a slant, so that as much stem is underground, as possible, yet not so deeply as to be kept cool. I often pour water down the hole and then push the soil shut around the stem. If it has rained recently, I usually don't even water. These slips grow roots very quickly. 7. Once the slips begin to grow you know that you are basically home free. They are going to live. Some years they will produce more than others. Last year wasn't a good year here. Early summer was way too cool. Then we went into 9 weeks of blazing heat, but no rain. When things moderated, and the rains came, temperatures dropped off again. So our crop was not very large. Some years we get an excellent crop. Usually, when it's hot, we get a good one. 8. Dig your sweet potatoes before temperatures get cool, in the fall. I say this, as it is best. But some years I don't get to them until frost. They're alright. But they probably won't keep as well if harvested after they have been allowed to chill. When you dig them, it is ideal to let them "cure" for a couple of days in a nice warm spot before gently storing them where you want them. Try not to move them around much, after harvest, as every time a sweet potato get's turned, some of the sugars in it are converted to starch, causing it to lose some sweetness. These sweet potatoes will probably keep until March or April, some even longer. 9.Be sure to set aside at least three medium (about 1 lb.) roots for starting slips in the new year. Keep them separate from the ones you're going to eat. Pick undamaged roots, so that they are more likely to keep. Store them in a warm place, no cooler than 55 F. if possible. Cooler temperatures will cause them to spoil. The best temperature for sprouting is 70 degrees and up. I think, if I really wanted to do the best sprouts, I'd sprout them at about 90 F! So, we try to start our sprouts before we stop burning wood in our wood stove. The planter is very close to the wood stove, and the sweet potato slips love it. Hope this helps! We believe you will enjoy growing sweet potatoes. Oh! Yes, one more tip. When you cook them, cook them at about 300-350 F. in a regular oven. Microwaving a sweet potato is detrimental to the flavor. Even if it should taste alright microwaved, it would be far better if cooked in a regular oven. Some people have complained that a variety of sweet potato doesn't have good flavor. I'm convinced that they microwaved it. When we cook them, they practically taste like candy. Here's a link to yet another discussion on starting sweet potatoes. George Tahlequah, OK Here is a link that might be useful: All About Sweet Potatoes/ OK Gardening Forum

I rooted some cuttings from a sweet potato vine last fall before the first frost, and planted them in the greenhouse for the winter. They didn't have enough light and crawled around all over the place losing most of the leaves except at the ends. Now I can cut those long vines into about 8 inch pieces and they root and sprout in in water in just a couple of days. I could have hundreds of sweetpotatos from this easy method and have been giving cuttings away right and left. The problem is that I have no idea what variety they are. An acquaintance offered me some thornless blackberry transplants this past week. I scored two new friends and 8 beautiful thornless blackberry plants. I plan to intentionally root new plants once the berries are picked so that I can pass on those plants to others. Keep paying it forward is the way to go!

Farmerdill said " . If the slips get too big you can cut the slip into 6 inches pieces and plant each piece." Do the roots grow from the bottom of the cut piece or from a leaf node. do you remove the leaves that are planted under the soil. My sweet potatoes have long vines that I want to cut and plant but I cannot find specifics about taking a long vine, cutting it up, and planting the pieces. Can someone help.

I tried the "long slip process" a few years ago. I planted the ends off some sweet potatoes my wife used for a meal on Thanksgiving or Christmas. I plant the sweet potato ends in a plastic rain gutter I have across the inside of the kitchen window. By planting time I had many long slips that producer well. I have never tried the plastic mulch but I had planned to this year but I did not have any at planting time. I only have 22 of the Beauregard sweet potatoes and about 30 ornamental. Larry This post was edited by slowpoke_gardener on Tue, May 13, 14 at 16:06