TROPICAL ROOT CROPSCANNA edulis - QUEENSLAND ARROWROOT - An edible canna growing to 2 metres, used to be grown commercially for starch before cassava\tapioca came to prominence. Corms can be eaten boiled or baked. The starch that can be washed out of the grated or pounded corms can be used to make cakes or as a thickener. Young shoots can be used as a vegetable and immature seeds are used in South America to make a type of Tortillas. Can be grown as a lush leafy screen, though frost will set it back in winter when the corms are ripe for harvesting. Corms $5 each. COLOCASIA esculenta - TARO - syn. Elephant Ears, Coco Yam. Grown widely in the Pacific & Asia for its starchy corms (often called tubers). The corms can be eaten boiled, steamed or fried, in soups & stews, made into puddings or pounded into dumplings. On Pacific Islands they are fermented into a starchy mass called 'Poi'. Different varieties can be grown in wetland or upland culture. Frost will kill leaves but plants revive in spring, the corms will take longer to mature in cooler areas. We grow all our varieties on pond edges or in well watered garden plots. We don't have names for our varieties as yet, they are numbered and described below. Small tubers $5 each. var. No.1 - Petiole (leaf stalk) purple at the base. The dot (on top of the leaf above the petiole) is white. (corm) flesh white with cream fibres. var. No.2 - Petiole green grading to purple at the top, purple dot, flesh white with purple fibres. var. No.3 - Petiole purple at the top, dot purple, flesh white with cream fibres. var. No.4 - Petiole light or yellowish green, dot white, flesh white. MANIHOT esculenta - CASSAVA - An attractive shrub growing to 2m. An important carbohydrate food grown in the tropics on land too dry for rice. Survives light frosts. Young leaves can be eaten cooked, fat tuberous roots are eaten boiled, fried, baked or made into flour. The refined starch is known as 'Tapioca' is used as a thickener. Stem cuttings which strike readily in warm weather are available all year but best purchased in late winter to Jan. $2 each. MARANTA arundinacea - JAMAICAN ARROWROOT – syn. West Indian Arrowroot. Tubers can be used like CANNA edulis. Grows to 1m, dies back in frost. Tubers or suckers available all year. $5 each. XANTHOSOMA sagittifolium - TANNIA - A Taro like plant but different in that sucker cormels are eaten rather than the mother corm, leaves are generally larger with more prominent veins. The 'V' of the arrowhead shaped leaf extends to the petiole. Requiring good moisture to do well but not grown in flooded soils. Corms are baked, boiled or fried and are excellent eating. Young leaves & petioles are cooked and eaten like spinach. Available all year $5 for corms or suckers. POLYMNIA sonchifolia - YUCON - A South American annual growing to about a metre. Yields delicious, large, sweet fleshy roots that can be eaten on their own or added to salads. A sweet juice that can be extracted from the grated pulp makes a refreshing drink or can be reduced to a form of sugar. Corms from which the roots grow are only available during dormancy from June till 31st of September. $5 each or $10 for 1 plant including postage if ordered on its own. MISCELLANEOUS
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