CHAPTER XXVI. 

 CULTURE OF SWEET POTATOES. 



iWEET potatoes are the most popular vegetable 

 produced in the South, being very extensively 

 grown and consumed locally. There are very 

 few truckers or growers who do not plant an- 

 nually more or less of this vegetable. 



A number of different varieties are pro- 

 duced. Some prefer the yellow kind, some the 

 red, and some the white. The yellow variety, 

 however, is the one most in favor in our markets. They have 

 adapted themselves to the different conditions of climate and the 

 soil everywhere. Large crops often follow upon fields where 

 former vegetable crops for the Northern markets have been 

 grown the previous season, land upon which egg plants, peppers, 

 tomatoes, snap beans, cucumbers, etc., have been grown the year 

 previous being particularly well adapted to the growth of sweet 

 potatoes. This soil being highly fertilized and free from weeds, 

 it is only necessary to remove the vines of the preceding crop, 

 plow it into ridges and after the ridges have firmed sufficiently, 

 stick out the potato vines about eighteen inches apart in the 

 row, the rows to be spaced three to four feet apart. The ridges 

 are thrown up from one foot to eighteen inches high. In case 

 the land is new, it is best to mow off the weeds, raking them 

 into small rows, ridging the earth over the same and as this 

 accumulation becomes rotted, it offers plenty of nutriment to the 

 sweet potato and has a tendency to keep the ground loose under 

 the hill, greatly facilitating the crop. Some of the best growers 

 use about 400 to 500 pounds of cotton seed meal in the ridge and 

 add a side application of the same amount after the vines are 

 half grown. This does very well and I would strongly recom- 



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