Maryland 810 Sweet Potato
About
Lots of good info in this sweet potato thread.
I have only grown sweet potatoes 2, possible 3 times. I stopped because the vines took over the landscape and also because of borer issues. Each year I produced my slips from a couple of locally grown sweets purchased from the local farmers market. Hence, I couldn't tell yo what variety I planted.
After looking at the posts with the attached linked references, I'm amazed at the number of selections that are out there for folks to choose from. The short vine varieties have particularly caught my attention. So do those of you who have lots of experienc growning sweetpotatoes choose a specific variety and keep a few sweet potatoes from one year to the next to use for producing your own slips? Or, do you re-order each year? If you reorder, do you order seed potatoes or slips?
I'm sure that there are those who order every year. I however save roots and start my own every year. For eight years my family and I lived in the Mexican state of Hidalgo and I had a hobby of scouting out local varieties and maintaining them. Some were extremely rare, taking up to four years to locate. Unfortunately, when we returned to the USA there was absolutely no legal manner to bring any back with us. It was SO TEMPTING to smuggle some in. But... that would be illegal, so I didn't.
Starting your own slips is not hard and it does save money. Plus, as in our family's case, it's one way to establish a family tradition. Our children have grown up looking forward to Red Wine Velvet sweet potatoes every fall and winter. Now that our son is in grad school it is cause for happiness when we load him up with a box of these, and he is able to share with some of his friends. He makes a point of baking some along with some store bought sweet potatoes, just so he can demonstrate just how extremely different varieties of sweet potatoes can taste (he's adamant that the Red Wine Velvet is vastly superior). The variety is extremely rare and has become a "family heirloom." Sandhill Preservation has done a lot to ensure the survival of their sweet potato collection. But accidents do happen. I can think of no better way to help ensure that it survives than to grow and maintain it myself.
Yet different folk garden for different purposes and have different limitations. If someone just wants to grow sweet potatoes and feels that life is too complicated to mess with growing slips, ... let him purchase slips, plant them and enjoy.
