Garden Club

Japanese Sweet Potato

Our first sweet potato was a Japanese Sweet Potato (JSP) that was given to us by Ms. Melinda.  She had noticed that her japanese sweet potato had sprouted and decided to donate this to our Garden Club back in 2021.  We have had one harvest in 2022 and this week we had access to our Garden Beds since the Church roof tiles were being repaired.  In 2022 the biggest japanese sweet potato weighed 432g and the recently harvested japanese sweet potato weighed 1000g (1kg).  We call it "Flex".

Interesting FACTS

1.     The Japanese Sweet Potato looks similar to the American yam and the Okinawan Purple Sweet Potato however it has a sweeter taste and softer flesh.

2.     The Japanese Sweet Potato has twice the daily recommended allowance for Vitamin A, one third the daily dose of Vitamin C and a good source of beta-carotene, Vitamin B6, potassium, iron and fibre.

3.     This potato originated from Central America, but it made its way to Japan in the 1600s.

We prepared the garden bed by adding leaf litter and Jacaranda blossoms and the hundreds of sticks we stockpiled.  Then added three complete worm farm castings into the bed we placed the japanese sweet potato in the centre of the bed and after a few weeks later there were many leaves growing from the vine.  We watered the beds every second day.

We were meant to harvest the japanese sweet potato every three months, however we found them to be a bit small, so we left them alone for another three months.  Every six months we celebrate “Potato Harvest” or Harvest for short.

A photo of 'Flex' is below: