Just make sure the soil is loose. I add compost and sandy grit to my heavy soil and they multiplied like mad. They prefer full sun - the flowers got 7ft last year.

thank you, cant wait to see how they do!

they can grow upto 8ft tall as mine have at the lotti. make sure they are somewhere not too windswept or else, they'll topple over and also, at the back of the border/bed as they'll cast shade on surrounding plants. i didn't really prepare the ground when they first went in and still got great crops. they're probably the easiest veg to grow. just plant and water now and again. wait till the first frosts in Nov. and they're ready from then on. i've still half my crop left out of 25 plants!

Very easy to grow. The sweet tubers are high in inulin, which has the amusing property of producing gas once in the digestive system. '*artichokes' we called 'em!

oh and by the way, don't bother buying them from garden centres etc. as mine were from a grocer's (you'll find them in decent ones) a couple of years back, and you'll not need to buy them again. they're about £2 per kg. not much compared to commercial places.

thank you all for your responses

I started with 5 tubers about 6 years ago,when we moved 2 years ago i left about 20 feet of plants behind in a 2 foot wide bed,nice surprise for the new tenants :-)
They will multiply like mad if you don't dig them up............