Veronica Yurchak, Vegetable Specialist, UMD; vjohnso4@umd.edu
Congratulations to Chris Burkhart for being the first to correctly identify this as deer damage in these sweet potatoes. Several people submitted correct guesses this week. While deer damage is typically light in large commercial sweet potato fields, it can be severe in smaller, fresh market plantings. Chewing damage to leaves, as is pictured here, will usually not kill the plant, but can significantly reduce yield. In same cases, deer will also dig into the ground and feed on the tubers. Interestingly, there appears to be a strong preference for the bushier variety pictured on the right over the one pictured on the left. (An interior row of the preferred variety was also severely damaged.)
