I think seed swapping is a wonderful way of being introduced to plants you may not consider trying to grow otherwise. Like the magnolia tree, another versatile name used for films, books, business names and restaurants, is Tamarind. I’ve always thought the tamarind tree was a lovely, graceful tree and didn’t really give much thought to being able to eat the fruits as well. Growing a tamarind tree to maturity could be quite worrying though, at a height of about 25 metres with a 7 metre spread, not only would it cover my small garden but probably four of my neighbours’ gardens as well. However, I have seen much smaller trees locally and since they can live up to 300 years and are slow growing, it will not be a worry meantime. I have been given tamarind seeds and they are now soaking prior to sowing so I will be looking forward to seeing the results.
In my new batch of gifted seeds, there is also papalo (Porophyllum ruderale)
from South America, I’ve never heard of it, but apparently it is similar to cilantro (coriander) and grows about 5 feet tall. My new seed in a similar vein last year was pipiche (Porophyllum tagetoides), a Mexican variety but it’s a dwarf at only about 2 feet tall. I have my pipiche seeds already sown this year although they haven’t germinated yet. The papalo seeds are almost identical in spite of being very much bigger. Where it’s described on one website as papalo being like a blend of cilantro, lime and nasturtium flowers, pipiche is described as citrusy-cilantro with overtones of anise.
Although both described as porophyllum, they look totally different.
My original thoughts were with being able to grow more plants vertically as my garden is so small and needing to depend mainly on containers. However, not only having magnolia, photinia red robin, Victoria plum, cocktail kiwi and lime caviar trees, I’ve also just planted up seeds from the Woodland Trust (they will ultimately go to more suitable homes) but having a small garden doesn’t mean you can’t think big.
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