sweet potato

Sometimes, good as they are, I just don't always get around to these sweet potatoes and they start to grow by themselves. The potato still feels hard, still edible, but the branches can get a bit long right there in the kitchen.

I took the perfectly good but branch growing potato outside and placed it on top of the dirt in a pot and kept it wet nearly as mud. And nothing happened. It just sat there for a couple of weeks and the branches it grew previously began to harden and die back. As if it didn't respond well to direct sun and to the light of day.

It was refocusing its potato attention on developing roots. I picked it up and examined. Tiny incipient roots down there. Pressed it back in the dirt and made a point of watering directly over the potato thereafter.

It might have gone a bit faster has I nicked off a slice from the bottom and sprinkled rooting enzyme powder. Maybe. It might have grown more branches had I gouged out a few eyes. It might have done a lot more had I cut it into chunks and placed them separately. I don't know.

As it is, the thing is taking over its area spreading in all directions, down, sideways, and up, but mostly across the floor. It must be sidestepped like hopscotch to get water to the other plants. This turned out a fun project. And now the weather is changing and its leaves starting to turn. I'll do this again next year.

It's the orange thing underneath the caladium leaves. It's own leaves bottom left. They're slightly larger than morning glory leaves also growing out of the same pot. Those morning glory vines like to grow upward far as they can go then spread across the railing going back and forth twirling around each other reinforcing one another and everything else around to pile up. They produce flowers constantly with flowers at every stage, brand new ones with old dead ones dropped off already forming a single seed. Eventually when it all comes crashing to a halt there will be a thousand morning glory seeds, and that's how they run rampant and why they are classified invasive species. Often in places there will be scant sign of life and the next season, boom, the whole fence is covered where nobody planted anything. This amazes people.

The branches are growing past the neighboring pots, up the leg of another planter, and right across to the door as if it's trying to come back inside. It gets stepped on. It's outrageous. It's fun. 

You should do this. What the heck.