Sweet potatoes how to grow and store them (input please)

This year I have set myself a rather large goal. I want to grow a year supply of sweet potatoes. Do to food allergies, we don’t have regular potatoes in the house. In general we go for the types, that are less sweet, so they are easier to use as a substitute for regular potatoes. We go through about 20 pounds each month, so a years worth will be around 240 pounds of sweet potatoes.
I also have to admit, that I have never grown them before. My husband has done it with a good result, and we have the perfect climate for it too.
So, February 1st. I laid 8 sweet potatoes into moist soil and tucked them in, so about 1/3 was in the soil. At first I had a few rot on me, but it think it was do to being bruised when we got them. 5 of them was a Bonita or Henry type, light brown on the outside and white on the inside. 3 are a Japanese type, that’s reddish purple on the outside and white on the inside. I don’t know the specific names of them, because I just took some out of our bulk grocery order and used those.
The light brown ones started to sprout after about a month, and after another week, the Japanese potatoes started too. We are now in late March and I have 80 slips from the brown ones, and 4 of the others. I do have many more coming of both, since the potatoes are still sprouting, but the Japanese potatoes does take longer to grow as well as sprout.
My goal was to get 40 slips, so I do have plenty. I am in a buy nothing group for my neighborhood, so I have started a list of neighbors who wants the leftovers.
Next weekend I am planting them, and it made me think about something important.
HOW DO I STORE THEM FRESH?
I already know that I will blanch and freeze some, and that I am not canning them. Last time I did, they got way too sweet.
I have been looking for answers online about curing and storing too, but are getting conflicting information.
Right up until almost Christmas, we will get very hot days. Especially from July through September. The sweet potatoes should be ready to harvest late June.
So, my questions are:
How do you cure them?   And
How do you store them fresh for use over fall, winter and spring?
All I have found is that they need to cure in a warm area, and that they need to be packed in paper before storing.

Ulla, thank you for a great topic on growing sweet potatoes.

I have always wanted to grow sweet potatoes until I read about curing them.

I hope some folks who grow sweet potatoes will answer your questions as I have them. too.

Here are a couple of threads from folks who looked online, too:

https://permies.com/t/169778/Curing-sweet-potatoes

https://permies.com/t/149262/Sweet-Potatoes-cure-sweet-potatoes

You're supposed to cure them in an 80 degree area but we don't have that in September in WI.  So we lay them out in the warmest place of the house (65F?) and let them cure there for a few weeks.  Then we store them in an open wire basket in a dark room that's around 60 degrees.  They keep through to the next summer so it seems to be adequate...

My understanding is they need 80 - 90° at a high humidity, that I can't remember - for a few weeks(). That's a tough one to do, in the winter, for most anyone I know. But, I read a few tricks somewhere(here, maybe?) like putting them in a plastic bag, on top of the refrigerator, or other consistently warm appliance. We put in a woodstove, in December, so I'm going to try putting them near that, this year.

As I said above, we do ok with a 65 degree basement that isn't particularly humid at that time of year.  I'd just give them a shot and do your best for curing but don't sweat it too much.

Someone else here with a cool house - noon here and it's 62F by my computer which is theoretically a "warmer" location.

So how would you cool climate people suggest I get some store bought sweet potatoes to start making slips?

Will they likely grow enough greens or potatoes to be worth it in a climate that cools off every night and is only warm in a sunny spot? If I only get edible greens, I'm willing to give it a go as an experiment.

Jay Angler wrote:Someone else here with a cool house - noon here and it's 62F by my computer which is theoretically a "warmer" location.

So how would you cool climate people suggest I get some store bought sweet potatoes to start making slips?

Will they likely grow enough greens or potatoes to be worth it in a climate that cools off every night and is only warm in a sunny spot? If I only get edible greens, I'm willing to give it a go as an experiment.

Sweet potatoes don’t like it cold, so I don’t know if you can grow it in your grow zone. As for sprouting your store bought sweet potato, that’s something I can tell you about.
Unless you know that your potato has not been sprayed with anti growth hormones, the first step is to gently wash it with plain water.
Next stick them into soil. You can either lay them down like I did, and bury then about 1/3 down, or you can bury them upright about 1/2 way down. The potatoes needs light and water to sprout, but don’t like being soggy, so make sure the soil is moist. After 4 to 5 weeks you will start to get sprouts. Let them grow to at least 6 inches before you remove them, and put them in water to root. You will find that some of the slips, will already have some root development, since you are growing them in soil.
Your slips are ready for planting, when they have good root development, but you can transplant them into pots first and let them grow there for a while too, if you have a very short growing season. I
Btw, all of my sweet Potatoes was also bought in a grocery store.
Here is an article I really like, about growing sweet potatoes https://www.groworganic.com/blogs/articles/planting-and-growing-sweet-potatoes

Last year, I planted mine in 5gal buckets, then when it got cold, I brought them in, to overwinter, and set them under grow lights for a while, then moved them to a sunny window. I never harvested the tubers, but we're still getting yummy greens, from them.

Okay, I live in a  very different climate than the OP  (West Virginia, longish warm growing season, humid, cold winter) and am growing different varieties--the sweeter the better as far as I'm concerned but I'm growing standard orange ones. For awhile I also had some beautiful deep purple (inside and out) ones which were champion sprouters, but they weren't good for frying (they didn't soften like the orange ones) and they were bad for growing long skinny tubers which would slither under the aisles and then dive deep into clay soil so they were hard to find and would mostly break during harvest. The orange ones are much better behaved.
But my experience with storage doesn't match what I've read. I typically harvest in October when humidity is lower and we're starting to fire up the woodstove sometimes. I wash them, which they say not to, but I store them on my pantry shelf and I'd rather not have dirt there, and no need because I find sweet potatoes are the easiest of all crops to store. I give them zero treatment, just lay them on a pantry shelf (it's mostly dark and perhaps slightly cooler than the rest of the house). They keep all winter, even the ones that got cut during harvest, or which I cut to get rid of a mouse chewed or diseased part. The cuts almost always heal over fine. But someone told me a few days ago that she has trouble with sweet potatoes rotting, which mystified me. My butternuts are getting hollow and fibrous inside (in March), my sweet potatoes are fine.
I'll also mention that I have a different approach to starting slips. I haven't tried the dirt immersion method. What I do is cut off the sprouting end, maybe an egg-sized chunk of the sweet potatoes--starting in February which is too early but when some are vigorously volunteering I can't repress the urge to start the first couple. I suspend this chunk in a small jar of water, using two or three toothpicks or small pieces of wire, so the cut end is in water and the sprouts face up. (The rest of the sweet potato I bake and eat.) They're on a windowsill whenever it isn't warm enough in my attached greenhouse. When the vines get maybe six inches long and with a few nice leaves, I pluck them off and put several together into a jar of water and compost the chunk. Some of the vines have roots attached and some don't but they usually will all make roots as long as you get them in a jar such that they aren't slipping down into the water. Eventually the roots will grow too long for the jar if it isn't tall enough, and will tangle into a mat you have to damage to pull apart, so ideally before that point you'll plant them, or if it still isn't warm enough, pot the earliest ones up individually in dirt. Some of this will not apply to the California person. Thing about sweet potatoes is they're hothouse snowflakes--they whine if it's chilly, never mind just not freezing, they hate forties. They'd rather not see fifties. So I set them out here in May. Which is why February is too early here--eventually they get yellow or purple leaves and stop growing, pining for soil. But I get away with it by potting up those first ones, which gives them a jump on establishment in the garden.

I have had bad luck growing sweet potatoes here in the PNWet.  Years ago I planted a couple.  They were the same size at the end of the growing season as at the beginning.  I buy them to eat at the store and they often rot within two weeks.  I sometimes store them in a cool, somewhat dark garage and they still rot.  Maybe a darker spot? The only cooler spot is the fridge.

John S
PDX OR

i grew sweet potatoes from homegrown slips for the first time last year! i had nowhere to cure them that was consistent heat, so i turned on a baseboard heater in the small upstairs bathroom and put some water in the tub. i put all the potatoes in a big rubbermaid bin in there for a while - a week or two? - and they cured SO well! i just used the last of them in a soup last week. they had hardly even begun to sprout so they probably would have lasted for many more months.

the way i stored them was in a cool area of the house in a rubbermaid bin with the cover half on (so, turned the wrong direction) that way there is airflow in the bin. my porch and basement are both cool with the basement definitely being cooler, but my porch is closer to the kitchen so i opted for that.

if i ever grow them again (which i definitely will!) i'll keep them in the basement and just go grocery shopping down there every so often lol.

i am in nova scotia which is zone 5b here but 4b according to USDA. my sweet potatoes were quite small because i did absolutely nothing to extend the season or warm the soil, but i'm sure with less compacted soil and hoop houses and whatnot, i could have gotten larger ones!

best of luck!

PS: i grew my slips using perlite and water on a heating mat with a glass dome over it (an old lamp shade, so there was a hole at the top for air flow. once slips started shooting up, i moved it into a couple of inches of soil in a tupperware container and put it under a growlight. none of the other methods worked for me. i tried water, i tried soil.. they rotted. the real winner was perlite and water to initiate the slip growing and THEN transferring to soil.

I am wondering if the stores cure the sweet pats they sell.  If they keep them in refrigerated storage, it might be better for them to not cure them.  That way, yours rot pretty quickly and you have to go to them for more.  I could see why they wouldn't want yours to store for months.

John S
PDX OR

Ulla,

You didn't say where you're located at. Without knowing what your growing conditions it hard to give advice.  I just took a class sponsored by WSU (Washington State, USA) that being said, soil temp must be 65 degrees min to plant outside.  To start your slips, they can be started with a heat mat. Make sure slips have lots of room and don't let them get root bound or pototoes will be disfigured Once your soil temp can maintain 65 degrees,  in Washington and Oregon,  end of May or 1st or second week in june.  Try to plant on a series of overcast days. Water for first week to 2 weeks.Time to maturity is 80-100 days.

Stop irrigation 1 week before harvest. Cut vines 1 day before harvest. Harvest before soil temp goes below 55 degrees

After digging up your Sweet Potatos don't leave in direct sunlight for more than a hour.  Cure on vented racks DO NOT WASH THE POTATOS!! Cure at 85-90 degrees at 85% humidity for 7-10 days

If cured properly, they will last for at least 6 months at 55-60 degrees at 80% humidity in a dark place.

John, DONT STORE POTATOS IN THE REFRIGERATOR! The most likely reason for the rotting is improperly cured potatoes.

Good luck, Happy planting
Michael Westbrook,
Phoenix Farm

All sources agree, don't wash them--Michael even put it in caps. But I wash mine, because I store them on a pantry shelf and I'd rather not bring dirt there. I have a few there still, six months later, and they're keeping just fine--even ones that have been cut. I cut the sprouty end off and suspend it in a jar of water--the rest of the tuber goes back on the shelf to be baked or fried whenever. Maybe it's a matter, as Michael said at the outset of his post, of climate. I live in WV, usually harvest sweet potatoes just before the first frost in October...last couple years we didn't get a killing frost till November but I harvested in October anyway when I saw some yellowing of leaves, and found some kind of black spots increasing on the test ones I dug. We heat with wood so temperature in my house varies, but is usually in the seventies in the day and goes into low sixties at night.

Michael Westbrook wrote:Ulla,

You didn't say where you're located at. Without knowing what your growing conditions it hard to give advice.  I just took a class sponsored by WSU (Washington State, USA) that being said, soil temp must be 65 degrees min to plant outside.  To start your slips, they can be started with a heat mat. Make sure slips have lots of room and don't let them get root bound or pototoes will be disfigured Once your soil temp can maintain 65 degrees,  in Washington and Oregon,  end of May or 1st or second week in june.  Try to plant on a series of overcast days. Water for first week to 2 weeks.Time to maturity is 80-100 days.

Stop irrigation 1 week before harvest. Cut vines 1 day before harvest. Harvest before soil temp goes below 55 degrees

After digging up your Sweet Potatos don't leave in direct sunlight for more than a hour.  Cure on vented racks DO NOT WASH THE POTATOS!! Cure at 85-90 degrees at 85% humidity for 7-10 days

If cured properly, they will last for at least 6 months at 55-60 degrees at 80% humidity in a dark place.

John, DONT STORE POTATOS IN THE REFRIGERATOR! The most likely reason for the rotting is improperly cured potatoes.

Good luck, Happy planting
Michael Westbrook,
Phoenix Farm

Thank you for writing about your experience. Sorry, that it has taken me so long to write back. For some reason, I didn’t get a notification that someone posted here.

My grow zone is 10b. You can see it next to my name on the left side of the screen. We live in the most Southern part of California, about 2 hours inland. The cold season goes from October to March, spring from March to the end of June. Then we have the Hot/fire season until October when things cool down again.

This spring has been wetter and cooler than it normally is. Normal in our area is to transplant WP around March first, but it has been too cold. After getting a soil temperature of 60F, I transplanted a few a week ago. They are doing okay, and I checked the soil temperature today, and the soil temperature are between 65 and 70 now measured 8 inches down. The plan is to start transplanting this weekend. We won’t get to all of them thought, since I need to process and or move the collards I have in the second bed, I want sweet potatoes in. I had minor surgery this week, so I have to take it easy for a bit. I am lucky to have an indoor nursery, so the plants will do fine until I can transplant them.
I did have a great experience with using soil to grow the slips. I have so far gotten 150 slips from the 5 brown skinned sweet potatoes I put in soil, and they are still producing. So far I have supplied 12 of my neighbors with slips LOL, since I only need 50 of them.The purple skinned sweet potatoes hasn’t given me a lot, and they grow much slower than the others. So far I have gotten 15 slips from the three I planted, which actually is the exact amount I needed.

I think I will do the curing in the garage. That time of year, there should be a high temperature in there. As for the humidity, I don’t know how to get it to 80%, especially for storing?
They will have to be stored in the garage after curing, so I worry about the high temperatures then, but maybe I can move them temporarily into my pantry.
The plan so far is to store them in boxes with open sides for air circulation, and to pad the sides of them with paper. One thing I have learned over the years, is that sweet potatoes are very sensitive to bruising. One bruise and they start rotting.

Hi,
I'm trying to find the non-sweet sweet potatoes to use as a substitute for Irish potatoes  just like the OP.
I'll  try to find them as organic produce and grow slips. Can anyone tell me their experience with the different ones? Does the sweetness have to do with color?

Thanks!

Cara Campbell wrote:Hi,
I'm trying to find the non-sweet sweet potatoes to use as a substitute for Irish potatoes  just like the OP.
I'll  try to find them as organic produce and grow slips. Can anyone tell me their experience with the different ones? Does the sweetness have to do with color?

Thanks!

The whole reason we grow sweet potatoes, are because my oldest and I are allergic to them. If you want less sweet potatoes, stay away from the orange kind. White flesh or even purple are less sweet. You can also look into different strains. Japanese sweet potatoes are usually less sweet, Henry and Bonita are also less sweet. The also differs in texture as some are more stringy than others.
While I love the Japanese strains of sweet potatoes, they do have one disadvantage as I can see. They are harder to grow slips from. When I brew slips here, I got an average of 30 slips pr sweet potato from my Henry and Bonita, but I only got 10 from the Japanese, and they took an extra 2 weeks before they started sprouting compared to the others.
I hope this helps you

Hello Everyone
Just wanted too add my 2 cents, might only be worth one, but here ya go.

How to grow... This is a great topic to discuss and through out my years in all different soil types and conditions for those found in zone 7 to 9. This is my experience with the most common Beauregard variety.

Forming slips- When I first started I would do as most. The jar, the toothpicks etc., having the tater start to rot around the toothpicks falling down in the jar, the smell of it and the water if you didn't change it. Waiting for what seems like forever to get some big enough. Then plucking them off, putting them in another jar to form roots and then potting them up if it was too early, trying to slow their growth till it was right outside etc...OR planting them before the season comes in a tub covered with soil hoping i was keeping them most enough and they would be ready when the season started. Big waste of time and energy, imo.

Several years ago I was down in the basement and noticed that years harvest starting to sprout. The slips were almost white and It was Dec...albeit it stays around 50 to 60 degrees down there depending if I have a window cracked and the temp outside. I thought to myself , hmmm. What am I going to do?
I took the sprouted ones and put them in a separate cardboard box, sat them on a bare concrete floor where they would get some indirect light and put my hand under faucet and just sprinkled some water on them making sure to get them all. A few weeks later they had started turning green, gaining some length and I wished them luck and walked away. About the middle of Jan. I notice them again, some were doing fine, new sprouts even.  A few were too dry and the tips had started to die back. I sprinkled some water again. Middle of Feb., The ones that had started to die back were now green and had new sprouts, the tips stayed dead but the leaves were nice and green. 3 mo. to go. hmm. I already had more than I needed, probably 30+ slips. No water. 2 weeks later, a little sprinkle. 2 weeks later a little sprinkle. April Fools day, oh the irony on my past efforts to get slips. I now had 50+. Took the best ones, cut the leggy and dead ended ones, still had more than I needed. I left them on the potato and shallow planted them in a 3 gal. tub, maybe 1/2 cup of water a week till end of May, they had doubled.

From that point on around Feb. I take a few and put them in a box with a few sprinkles of water, set them in the exact same place and have never not had enough. They didn't take my canning jars, my windowsills, my sun room space, no changing the water, no rotting, no smell, no losses w/ little to no care. I don't even bother with forming roots before I plant, no losses. I take the tub to the bed, pluck them, poke them, water them in, done.

Growing- I always use a raised bed 12" high at least, filled with at least 1/2 the volume of fresh compost, some finished some not, why? S'taters need a well drained humus rich deep soil bed. The not finished compost will feed during the season. The first time I tried this method I pulled 40+lbs from a bed that was 2.5' wide 3.5' long 12" deep with 9 slips,,.. why change. The rabbits loved the vines overflowing from that little bed, I was glad to feed them. They had babies in my radish patch, I stayed away when I seen all those little eyes lookin' up at me. The harlequin bugs got their fill of them as I watched Mom & Dad lead them out of the nest and into the Asparagus patch that was about 4' wide 50' long where they lived that year. Watching them learn how to hop and control themselves. I'll never forget that. I hope for it every year since. Still enjoyed my icicles too.

Curing- I wait till the vine dies back or close to it. I always leave about a 4'x4' area beside the bed. After I cut the vine I leave them in the ground as I dig a hole about the same size as the bed,length width and depth. I layout a decent bit of filter cloth or weed cloth 3 or 4 times the size of the hole area, lay the cloth in the hole and then dbl it, pull the taters and put them on the cloth in the hole. Don't throw you taters!!! Take the time and place them gently in a pile on the cloth in the hole. Make sure to leave an area of cloth around the taters so when you cover them it can be tucked top to bottom. I cover them with the dirt for a cpl 3 weeks as I figure where they are going to live for the Winter. Never use a brush or something that will break or scrape the skin if they have a lot of soil on them . I just gently rub them in the grass to get the majority off AFTER they have cured. I leave 1 end of the empty folded cloth above ground. When I decide to store them, I find the fold and unfold until I can see the taters. I don't pull the cloth and taters from the ground because of bruising and scraping. I have my boxes ready to be filled at the hole. I don't wash them to store and I keep them in the same open top cardboard boxes. Once a week I will go and smack the side of the box and check for flying critters. Other than enjoying them that's about it.

There's a myriad of ways to do things, this is mine. It's easy, it's simple, it's practical. I hope you try it, better yet, change it to suit you and make it yours. Good luck.

My first time commenting.
I live in Central NC.
Last year I planted sweet potatoes with my corn. The leaves on the sweet potatoes went crazy! When it was time to harvest I had aprox. 40 lbs of sweet potatoes How to cure them...well I read on some you tube channel this guy put a pan of water on the bottom of is oven and put a string of incandescent christmas lights in the oven with his potatoes. I tried that and the lights heated up the oven nicely but I use my oven often so I lined a box with foil put a pan of water in the bottom put bricks and  wood supports to hold  the potatoes 3 layers  then put the lights inside.
I gave most of the potatoes to a non profit " The Table" I keep a few which lasted months.
I had one left that I used to grow this years crop. Love this site thanks for all the great info

Joanne Field wrote:My first time commenting.
I live in Central NC.
Last year I planted sweet potatoes with my corn. The leaves on the sweet potatoes went crazy! When it was time to harvest I had aprox. 40 lbs of sweet potatoes How to cure them...well I read on some you tube channel this guy put a pan of water on the bottom of is oven and put a string of incandescent christmas lights in the oven with his potatoes. I tried that and the lights heated up the oven nicely but I use my oven often so I lined a box with foil put a pan of water in the bottom put bricks and  wood supports to hold  the potatoes 3 layers  then put the lights inside.
I gave most of the potatoes to a non profit " The Table" I keep a few which lasted months.
I had one left that I used to grow this years crop. Love this site thanks for all the great info

I have seen those videos as well. Heat isn’t a problem for us though, since it will get very hot here during the summer and fall. In fact, sweet potatoes usually continues growing into November, if you let them. It’s not an option for us though, since I need the growing space for my cold weather crops.
So far, my plan is to harvest and cure in October and November, but I will start harvesting some in August and September. It will depend on the weather though. Right now they are all growing like crazy, since we are finally getting some warmer weather. It has been unusually cold and raining this year.

Heat is one thing we never get here. The all-time high for my location is 33 C and most years we might hit 30 once, around the end of January. But kūmara (the Māori name for sweet potatoes) is a well-known and widely grown crop around the entire North Island and the warmer parts of the South, and for about 700 years was the primary staple grown by people here. So there's a lot of knowledge embedded in the culture that deals with the extremely marginal conditions we have in most of the country for what is really a tropical plant.

Traditionally, most methods are pretty similar. You start your tupu (slips) in late winter in a protected spot like a windowsill or sunny porch. Generally, the best tubers are saved for planting but not always the biggest, as these would be reserved for feeding guests of honour. As the sprouts reach 15-20 cm in length, they are pulled off and either bundled and put in buckets, or planted in pots to start developing.

Beds are worked and prepared for planting in the middle of spring. In some regions the arrival of the shining cuckoo is the sign to start this work, and that's right around the equinox. in colder areas some tribes would incorporate charcoal from cooking fires into the top layer of soil to darken it and get it to warm up earlier. I do this as well. Tupu get planted out well after the last frost. Most years I get mine in the ground in November. I usually hold off on mulch to let as much sun onto the bed as possible.

By new year's the vines are running like mad and this is when I'll add a layer of mulch to help keep moisture levels up. It's a really low-maintenance crop for me...the mulch and dense leaves mean weeds are pretty much out of the picture. I sometimes give them manure or seaweed tea early in the season but apart from that their needs are met from the soil.

At harvest, the main objective is to lift the tubers as gently as possible. Any broken or bruised ones are kept apart from the main storage crop, and eaten within a week or two before they get moldy. All the kūmara for storing get brushed clean and then I lay them on clean pine shavings, with cardboard separating the layers, in banana boxes. The small and ropy ones get chucked in a brown paper bag. Then I put them all in the laundry room, which tends to stay between 15-20 C and has a bit of added humidity when clothes are hung to dry on rainy days.

They store really well with this method and we usually have from six to eight months' worth of kūmara after a harvest. The traditional way that most Māori did it was to dig a pit or build an earthen storehouse (some coastal tribes buried them in sand dunes). The rua kūmara is a carefully designed and managed root cellar and the various techniques used to make them show how crucial it was to keep the tubers from rotting or being eaten by vermin until they could be grown again...getting it wrong could have fatal consequences.

For me, all the stuff about preparing the tubers for storage is odd. Here's what I do: dig them before frost, or when I see some yellowing, usually October. Put them all in a bucket to tote them into the house. Wash them, because I'm going to put them on a pantry shelf and I'd rather not have dirt there. As soon as they're dry I put them on my pantry shelf; if there isn't room for all of them I put some in boxes upstairs. I set aside those with multiple cuts, or scrawny ones for my goat friends, but I find even a sweet potato I've sliced through will heal over. I hardly ever see any rot, and they keep well until spring, at which time they begin sprouting from one end--I cut some of them off to start slips, and can still use the rest of the tuber for eating, immediately or not. NOTHING keeps as long and with as little care, as sweet potatoes. So I'm mystified by those who talk about difficulty keeping them from rotting about gentle handling and no washing...maybe it's because here too we usually have at least some warm humid weather into October?

Mary Cook wrote:I'm mystified by those who talk..... about gentle handling and no washing...maybe it's because here too we usually have at least some warm humid weather into October?

Happy to hear success and methods as with everyone else's

For me, I've learned that the gentle handling is to cause less abrasion or damage the skin. It provides and easier entry point for bugs, mainly flies, It's also some what of an attraction for moisture, egg laying potential. They introduce bacteria etc. cause rotting if it isn't an air-borne mold. The no washing is all part of the gentle handling idea to minimize injury and it provides somewhat of a protective layer against. Once the sand dries it's like little shards of glass but bigger than diatomaceous earth. The abrasions also cause moisture loss and expends energy and moisture from the tuber itself as it heals-over.

I'd also like to say most of these methods were way before refrigeration, window screens, and cardboard.

Edit: Even running water much less a tub to wash them in besides the "Crick"

It's a Testament to how well it worked.

I'm noticing from reading that curing and curing process seems to be a bigger challenge the farther north you are.

Maybe Because in the south the following is common

"Cure sweet potatoes by holding them for about 10 days at 80-85°F and high relative humidity (85-90 percent). In the absence of better facilities, they can be cured between 65-75°F for 2-3 weeks."