Ipomoea hybrid – Proven Accents^{^®} Sweet Caroline Sweetheart Mahogany^™ – Ornamental Sweet Potato Vine

Garden Height

6 - 16

Spacing

12 - 18

Spread

20 - 36

Habit

Trailing

Container Role

Spiller

Flower Size

Short

Light Level

Part Sun to Sun

Great foliage component plant in combinations; excellent heat tolerance and good vigor, the heartshaped leaves catch the eye.

Significantly improved over Sweet Caroline Sweetheart Red, Mahogany is far more saturated mahogany red and retains its color well in full sun. The habit is more mounded due to shorter internodes, but it does trail as it matures through the season. A good match to Sweet Caroline Sweetheart Jet Black™ and Sweetheart Lime.

Features

Great foliage component plant in combinations; excellent heat tolerance and good vigor, the heartshaped leaves catch the eye.

Dead-Heading Not Necessary

Heat Tolerant

Foliage Interest

Maintenance Notes

Ipomoeas are great additions to combination planters, but they can sometimes overwhelm less vigorous plants. You can let your combination plants duke it out Darwinian style, however, if you prefer to keep a more balanced look to your combination planters, you can cut back or remove stems at any time to give other less vigorous plants a better change to compete for space.

Ipomoeas also make great annual groundcovers in the landscape. They love the heat and humidity, cooler temperatures and low humidity cause them to stay more compact.

While Sweet Potatoes all come from the same parent material out of Southeast Asia, there is a big difference between the Sweet Potato you buy in the store and the tubers produced by the Sweet Caroline plants. Commercial sweet potatoes have been bred for over 100 years selecting for those with the best sugar to starch content (hence the name SWEET Potato), the ornamental versions have been bred to produce good leaves and no tubers, though they do sometimes form small tubers. these tubers are composed of almost pure starch and no sugar; making them a poor choice for eating. So yes you can eat the tubers, but don't expect anyone to come back for seconds! Also always be careful when eating any ornamental plant unless you know how it was grown, and if pesticides or fungicides were used on it before you got it; a tuber is a storage root, and yes they store chemical as well as starch.

An application of fertilizer or compost on garden beds and regular fertilization of plants in pots will help ensure the best possible performance.

Uses Notes

Works great in landscapes as an annual ground cover, as well as in combination planters and containers by themselves. The plant is very adaptable, working in both sun and shade conditions, atlhough the heart shaped leaves have deeper and brighter colors in full sun than they do in shadier environments where colors are tinged with more green.

Maintenance Category Easy

Water Category Average

Bloom Time

Flower Form Border Plant, Container, Containers, Groundcover, Landscape, Mass Planting