Sweet potato · Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan
When to plant sweet potatoes in Lahore
Main outdoor window
17 Feb - 3 Mar
The window this page is built around.
Timed from last spring frost
27 January
In Lahore, on your chosen risk.
Ready to pick
18 May - 17 Jun
If you plant at the start of the window.
The average last frost. Half of all years are later than this.
Step by step in Lahore
Each window is a range, not a single day. Earlier in the range buys you a longer season; later in it buys you a safer one.
Plant out
17 Feb - 3 Mar
Three weeks after your last frost.
Harvest
18 May - 17 Jun
Sweet potatoes through the year
Against the frost risk in Lahore
Why these dates
Plant slips three weeks after last frost into soil at 18C or above. In cool climates, black plastic mulch is the difference between a crop and a disappointment.
Damaged at 1C - even a near-frost harms the roots. Lift before the first frost, not after it.
Seed packets and extension guides express timing as weeks either side of the last spring frost, because that is the only reference point that travels. Sweet potatoes are timed with planting out 3 weeks after it, and this page simply resolves those offsets against the frost date computed for Lahore.
Also in Lahore
Other vegetables to time
Growing sweet potatoes in Lahore
When should I plant sweet potatoes in Lahore?
Aim for 17 Feb - 3 Mar in an average year. If you would rather not gamble on the weather, wait until 27 Feb - 13 Mar - by then frost has finished in nine years out of ten.
When will sweet potatoes be ready to harvest in Lahore?
Expect to start picking around 18 May - 17 Jun, based on 90 to 120 days to maturity from the planting date calculated for this location.
How much frost will sweet potatoes tolerate?
Damaged at 1C - even a near-frost harms the roots. Lift before the first frost, not after it.