Oriental sweet potatoes (slips/plants)- /Red Skin Yellow Flesh, asian vegetable,

also known as Japanese sweet potatoes or Japanese yams,

Japanese sweet potatoes (Ipomoea batatas) These types feature pink to dark purple skin with creamy golden flesh. Japanese sweet potato flesh tends to be much drier than the orange-fleshed .These potatoes can prove difficult to find, so you can grow the vines, called slips, to grow your own Japanese sweet potato crop in your garden.
Nutty and mild, Japanese sweet potatoes have a thin red skin and dense Yellow flesh. They are a bit drier and more sweeter than the red skin white flesh vegetable you may also know as a yam or sweet potato. Often baked, candied or made into pies, they also make a delicious side dish when scalloped with sliced apples and a creamy sauce.
I have grow Japanese sweet potatoes,in half-whiskey barrel containers.
I got just as much yield from the container as I did from a Raised Bed, but it was so much easier to harvest the Sweet Potatoes in the container. It would take me a over an hour to dig up the Raised Bed and find all of the Sweet Potatoes. With the container, all I had to do was to dump the container onto some newspapers and the Sweet Potatoes would just appear. No digging. No hunting.

Before you plant sweet potato slips, you have a little extra work to do. Sweet potatoes need loose, well-drained soil to form large tubers. You don't want the roots to face resistance when they try to expand within the soil. Loose soil is more critical than almost any other factor when it comes to growing sweet potatoes successfully.

Plant slips in prepared soil with the roots pointing down. Position the slip so that the bottom half will be covered with dirt while the top half with all of the new leaves is above ground.

When to harvest sweet potatoes ? Typically, most varieties will take about three to four months to mature – about 90 to 120 days, but there are some newer varieties that take less time and are bred specifically for short-season northern climates (such as Georgia Jet, Vardaman, Centennial).

While some varieties grow better in northern gardens, it is important to harvest your sweet potatoes prior to any frost or freeze, no matter where you live. If you have a shorter growing season, your potatoes may be smaller in size but will still have the same wonderful taste as larger spuds. Watch the weather report and harvest your sweet potatoes when the night time temperatures start to dip into the 40s to 30s to ensure that none of your crop is lost to frost. The longer you are able to keep the plants in the ground, the larger and more numerous your harvest will be.