How to Grow Sweet Potatoes in a Raised Garden

Growing vegetables in a raised garden provides a variety of benefits, including the ability to enhance your soil more easily and reach the garden bed more readily. Virtually any vegetable you would plant in a standard home garden will also thrive in a raised bed. Grow sweet potatoes in a raised garden, planting them along with your other garden vegetables for a healthy and tasty harvest.

Raised garden bed (6 to 12 inches high)
Sandy garden soil (equal parts topsoil, compost and coarse sand)
Granular fertilizer (10-20-10)
Trowel
Sweet potato slips
Shredded bark or leaves

Instructions

- 1
  Add the granular fertilizer to the garden soil, applying 1/2 pound of fertilizer over every 20 feet of row. Mix the fertilizer into the soil well.
- 2
  Dig holes for the sweet potato slips, which are saved roots suitable for transplanting, with the trowel, spacing each hole 12 inches apart. Make the holes deep enough to bury the slip so that only the top leaves stay above the soil level. Space rows for vining sweet potatoes 4 feet apart and rows for bush sweet potatoes 2.5 feet apart.
- 3
  Place each slip into the prepared holes and firm the garden soil gently around the slips.
- 4
  Water the sweet potato slips immediately after planting to saturate the soil.
- 5
  Pull weeds by hand as they appear between the sweet potato plants to control weed growth in the raised bed. Apply 2 to 3 inches of shredded bark or leaves to control weed growth, if you desire.
- 6
  Water the sweet potato plants regularly to keep the soil evenly moist. Avoid allowing the soil to dry to the point of the foliage wilting because this can result in lower-quality sweet potatoes.
- 7
  Harvest sweet potatoes by gently digging them from the soil after the foliage begins to turn yellow, generally 130 to 170 days from planting. Cut the sweet potatoes from the vines with a sharp knife or pruning shears.
- 8
  Cure sweet potatoes in a warm and humid environment for about one to two weeks. After curing, store sweet potatoes at about 60 degrees Fahrenheit.

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