Subject: Sweet potatoes as leafy forage?

From: YankeePerm <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 1997 10:46:32 EST

Ok, I was digging sweet potatoes (Ipomea batcas) yesterday and looking at the
zillions of little roots that never got big in amongst the hand-fillers and
thinking, there is a use for these.  In the past, we had rabbits and we fed
them to the rabbits.  For various reasons unrelated to the pleasures of eating
rabbit, we have not got any yet at Barking Frogs Farm.

However it occurs to me that I can place the little tubers under mulch in the
pasture, which is often wet, and grow the leaves as forage for my steer (soon,
I hope, to be joined by a few Asian water buffalo).  I'm not sure how much
forage the tubers will stand.  I'm also not sure if I allow them to
"perennialize" if I will be breeding the little root borers that ruin sweet
potatoes when grown repeatedly from roots (vs "slips")  

I'm thinking that these will go well in wetter parts of the pasture (well we
have an acre under water at the moment--not there!).  One produces slips by
putting roots in a wet environment.  Storage roots are important only to the
extent that they enable the plants to survive grazing cycles.  

Does anyone have any experience using sweet potato LEAVES as forage?  How
about water spinach?  (either I reptans or I aquatica)  

The present sweet potatoes are part of a year long cycle I use here for
bringing land into cultivation.  First I grow Andean (white) potatoes by
throwing cut pieces on the ground and covering with mulch. I generally
broadcast a bit of bone meal to help the potatoes repell Colarado potato
beetles. As I harvest the white potatoes, I transplant sweet potatoes after
them (They are very unrelated).  Generally, I supplement the mulch over the
growing season as it melts away rapidly in our hot, humid climate.  Being near
our poultry house, the sweet potatoes got a bit of litter from coop cleaning
as well.  Now, digging the sweet potatoes I'm cutting through remaining tree
roots so that less competitve plants might make a go here.  Next can come
anything, legumes, greens, etc.  It is an easy way to move into garden spaces,
particularly when one first occupies a site and there is SO much to do.  We
have gotten quite respectible crops of both white and green spuds.

So, now I want to hear from folks who can tell me about sweet potato as
forage.  I don't need to reinvent any wheels!

For Mother Earth, Dan Hemenway, Yankee Permaculture Publications (since 1982),
Elfin Permaculture workshops, lectures, Permaculture Design Courses,
consulting and permaculture designs (since 1981), and now correspondence
courses via email.  One is now underway.  Next Live program:  Paraguay,
8/10-22/98. Internships available. Copyright, 1997, Dan & Cynthia Hemenway,
P.O. Box 52, Sparr FL 32192 USA  [email-masked]  

We don't have time to rush.

A list by topic of all Yankee Permaculture titles may be found at
http://csf.colorado.edu/perma/ypc_catalog.html

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From: Keith Johnson <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 1997 12:56:12 -0800

YankeePerm wrote:
> thinking, there is a use for these.  
> 
> pasture, which is often wet, and grow the leaves as forage for my steer  I'm not sure how much
> bringing land into cultivation.   
> 
> forage.  

Dan, 
Since we and the deer both like to eat the leaves of sweet potato, I bet
the steer and H2O buffalo would love it. Likewise the water spinach. How
much browsing they can tolerate, I don't know. Keep us up to date with
your experiment. Thanks.-- 
Keith 	
[email-masked]

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From: Keith Johnson <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 1997 12:56:12 -0800

Dan,