Radix: Alive at Five

I was recently reminded that Radix: the Blog has just passed its fifth birthday. Unlike Stalin, I had no five year plan when I began it. But like Chairman Mao, maybe I've achieved the occasional Great Leap Forward. Although it doesn't do to dwell on the negative, I've had a few reversals of fortune on the way too; gardening is like life in that respect.

So what has Radix actually achieved in the last five years? Here are a few highlights, in no particular order:

Oca
I've shown that breeding Oxalis tuberosa is possible with limited time, resources and talent. My ocas have been begetting in a Biblical manner - I'm now onto my 5th generation from seed, with seedlings popping up regularly where they shouldn't. Oca is well adapted to our maritime climate, but I haven't yet found that elusive day-neutral specimen which will tuberise in the summer and catapult it into the mainstream. Perhaps others will.

Mauka
After decades of yearning, I finally managed to obtain seeds of Mirabilis expansa, one of the rarest of root crops. I also managed to produce a small crop of "seeds" of my own using a shed, a wrist watch and some black plastic. As a result, mauka has now been cultivated in Norway and Germany as well as North America. I feel that one day mauka will be recognised for its many virtues. And unlike a certain other Andean root crop that starts with an m and ends with an a, it's actually pleasant to eat. I'm not talking about maca....

Anchote
Even in the spectacularly awful summer of 2012, my truly puny Coccinia abyssinica plants from the Ethiopian Highlands produced perfectly palatable and surprisingly large roots. What might they have done in a passably good summer?

Yacon
Thanks to Frank van Keirsbilck and some inadvertent crossing with a crop wild relative, I am now in possession of an enormous, vigorous yacon hybrid, which I have named Smallanthus x scheldewindekensis. So far no one is beating a path to my door, but it can only be a matter of time. Normal yacons seem demure by comparison, although they taste better. Maybe I should make some yakraut with the hybrid and see what happens?

Talet
Although I haven't persuaded everyone to abandon 'hog peanut' and adopt the name 'talet', my respect for and interest in Amphicarpaea bracteata and its close relative yabumame remains undiminished. Talet is an outstanding wild edible and grows quite happily in Cornwall.

Hopniss
I obtained seeds from what is (was?) the world's most northerly diploid population of Apios americana. The plants are (hopefully) still alive. In my world, that's a success.

Bulbs a plenty
I've enjoyed the experience of growing the edimental bulbs cacomitl, camas and Triteleia laxa in my bulbous belly border project. I can confirm that they all taste good.


And, for the sake of balance, here are few a few slightly less successful projects:

Mashua
Grows like a weed, looks lovely and yields abundantly; what's not to like? The small matter of its taste. Boiled, it's disgusting and even lactofermentation cannot redeem this incorrigibly unpleasant foodstuff. Yet some beg to differ, hence my mashua survey, which will doubtless yield something more interesting than the kilos of mashua I have to dispose of every year.

Sweetpotato: Ipomoea batatas is a delicious, versatile and vigorous crop - if you live somewhere warm. I live in Cornwall. I tried some high altitude sweetpotato seeds from Papua New Guinea (as one does) in the hope of finding something more suitable to our temperature regime. Here are the results; judge for yourselves. My foray into crop wild relatives using I. pandurata (mecha-meck) and I. leptophylla (man-root) hasn't produced anything I can eat. Downhearted? Not I!

Ahipa 
Pachyrhizus ahipa: nitrogen fixing, edible raw. Probably needs a warmer climate than we have here. Shame.

Ulluco
Ullucus tuberosus, the Ingrid Bergman of Andean root crops has been reduced to side show stunts like this. Shame on me. If only she had fulfilled her part of the bargain by giving some decent yields I would never have sunk so low. Things may be looking up on the ulluco front, however.


Given my lack of an initial five year plan, maybe I ought to initiate one now. If pressed, I might suggest the following avenues of research:

• Trawl the genus Ipomoea for potential sweetpotato substitutes and enjoy some more crop wild revelry.

• Intensify investigations into leguminous root crops such as hopniss, aardaker and the members of the genus Amphicarpaea

• Continue to explore the potential of oca by growing an outrageously large number of seedlings.

• The great family Apiaceae, the umbellifers, have been heinously neglected by me, save for my not entirely successful attempts at yampah cultivation. In the hope of banishing arracacha angst, I've been growing species like skirret for a while, but haven't posted about them. This must change.  

• Make rooty explorations of the floras of Africa, Australia and the Himalayan region. There's plenty of good stuff there.

• And - of course - I'm open to suggestions (and germplasm) of anything you recommend.

I know for sure that I will be exhausted long before the plant kindom gives up all its riches; I wouldn't have it any other way.