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How to Grow Sweet Potato Vines

Sweet Potato Vine in containers
Photo Credit
Kathryn Roach
Botanical Name
Ipomoea batatas
Hardiness Zone
9
10
11

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Planting, Propagating, and Caring for the Sweet Potato Vine

Carol Connare
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Sweet potato vine is a beautiful and versatile ornamental plant with cascading foliage that comes in a variety of colors. This easy-to-care-for tender perennial is a favorite among gardeners for its ability to add drama and color to containers and garden beds. This article will cover everything you need to know about planting, propagating, and caring for sweet potato vines.

About Sweet Potato Vines

Gardeners everywhere have a sweet spot for sweet potato vines. Their lush, leafy, vividly colored trailing vines (falling as much as 10 feet) add contrast, cover, and “kick” to container arrangements. 

Ornamental cultivars have been bred for visual appeal, not growers’ appetites. These sweets are eye candy: Their foliage colors range from burgundy to nearly black, chartreuse, deep purple, and light green to red, variegated (green with pink or white), and yellow, and their leaves can take on exotic forms, including three-lobe, heart- shape, and maple leaf. These cousins of the morning glory (Ipomoea purpurea) occasionally produce small, trumpet-shaped flowers that are insignificant. At first frost, the plants go dormant.

Although sweet potato vine’s root tubers can be eaten, consumption is not advised, as their taste is variously described as bitter, starchy, and unsatisfying. If you are looking for the crop, check out our sweet potato guide.

Sweet potato vine is a tuberous-rooted tender perennial native to tropical America. It is winter-hardy in Zones 9 to 11 and grown as an annual elsewhere.

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Planting

After all danger of frost has passed and daytime temperatures are consistently above 50°F, plant in a potting mix amended with compost and/or aged manure; ornamental sweet potato vines are relatively heavy feeders. Add a slow-release balanced fertilizer.

Propagating Sweet Potato Vines

Purchasing tubers in the spring or overwintering them in a dry medium such as vermiculite or peat is each an option.  When eyes appear, cut the tubers into pieces, with at least one eye per piece. Alternatively, in early spring, poke three or four toothpicks into the middle (waist) of a sweet potato. Then, suspend it on the toothpicks in a glass of water so that it is halfway submerged. It is ready for planting when sprouts appear. This is very similar to growing an avocado tree.

Plants can also be started from cuttings. Take a vine cutting and remove the foliage, except for a few leaves at the top. Place the cutting in water. Roots will form at the leaf nodes. The cutting is ready to plant when a small clump of roots appears.

beautiful foliage of dark red and lemon green sweet potato vines
Photo: Vladimir Woitscheck

Growing

Place in full or partial sun. Note that although plants are highly adaptable to varying light levels, foliage color is enhanced in the sun and diminished in the shade.

Water to keep the soil evenly moist; excess moisture can cause root rot. Sweet potato vine can tolerate some drought, but if it wilts, watering it well should enable its recovery.

According to the UF/IFAS Center for Land Use Efficiency, “Other than an occasional trimming, ornamental sweet potato is an undemanding plant. The vines will let you know when they need water by wilting, and the foliage quickly springs back from a light frost.”

Apply a balanced liquid fertilizer every 2 weeks.

Sweet potato vine spreads when leaf nodes that are in contact with the soil send down roots. This can create crowding and choke out neighboring plants. To prevent this, prune as needed.

Types

  • Ipomoea batatas ‘Ace of Spades’: spade-shape, dark purple leaves
  • I. batatas ‘Garnet Lace’: leaves emerge bright green, then turn deep red
  • I. batatas ‘Goldfinger’: three-lobe, bright chartreuse leaves
  • I. batatas ‘Lady Fingers’: deeply lobed, medium-green leaves with burgundy stems and veins
  • I. batatas ‘Marguerite’, aka ‘Margarita’: graceful, cascading habit; lemon-lime or chartreuse foliage
  • I. batatas ‘Pink Frost’, aka ‘Tricolor’: variegated green, pink, rose, and white foliage
  • I. batatas Sweet Caroline series: generally smaller root systems; variety of leaf colors
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Wit and Wisdom

  • The sweet potato is a symbol of good luck in many cultures.
  • The genus name is thought to come from the Greek words ips, for “worm,” and homoios, for “resembling”—referencing the way in which the plant spreads roots underground. The word batatas means “potato” in the indigenous Caribbean Taíno culture. 
  • Do not confuse it with wild potato vine (Ipomoea pandurata). 
     

Pests/Diseases

Flowers
About The Author

Carol Connare

As the 14th editor of The Old Farmer’s Almanac, Carol Connare works with writers and other editors to develop “new, useful, and entertaining matter” for the annual Almanac as well as books, calendars, and other publications. Read More from Carol Connare

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