Sweet Potato Blossoms

Sweet Potato Blossom

Our Sweet Potatoes have had a couple of blooms these last couple of weeks.  The blossoms are very pretty and are not very common.  In fact propagators who try to cross various breeds have a hard time with the blooms and have try to force them to bloom.

So my first thought, "I want to collect the "true seeds" they will produce, and then next year just plant the seeds rather than starting slips ".

It turns out that if the bloom becomes pollinated its seeds if planted will not be true to parent, or will grow "junk" tubers.  Just like if you plant the seeds from an apple core you may end up with 1 in 100 or 1 in 1000 that makes a good eating apple similar to it's parent.  This is why apples and so many other plants are propagated with cuttings, grafting or in the case of sweet potatoes, slips.  For now I will stick to growing my own slips for sweet potatoes, but I will enjoy the blooms when they come.