Sweet potato vine ipomoea batatas named for its edible cousin is an ornamental warm season annual grown for its attractive leaves and vining habit.
Ornamental sweet potato vine flower.
While it does produce edible sweet potato tubers albeit not very palatable and bitter the ornamental variety bears more colorful foliage making it a popular houseplant.
The ornamental sweet potato plant ipomoea butatas is somewhat different from its southern grown vegetable sibling.
That means the tubers it forms are actually edible.
This heat loving perennial will die back if the plant experiences hard freezes below 32 degrees fahrenheit 0 c.
Ipomoea butatas or sweet potato vine thrives in hot tropical climates and is an ornamental foliage plant often used as a foil for flowering displays.
Often grown in container gardens for its trailing stems of purple chartreuse or variegated foliage ornamental sweet potato vine is actually related to the sweet potatoes you d grow in your vegetable garden.
Ornamental sweet potato vine ipomoea batatas is valued for its colorful foliage and rapid easy care growth habits.
The foliage lends a tropical feel to the garden and comes in a range of colors and varying forms.
Popular varieties like marguerite have small round tubers while varieties like blackie have longer narrower tubers.