Himalayan Balsam

[ottawagardener]

No, I am not encouraging anyone to plant this!

www.eatweeds.co.uk/himalayan-balsam-seed-curry-recipe

However, I have recently been reading reports of people using the seeds as a sort of grain in curries etc... Anyone on here tried this? I have some bicolour popping balsam here and was thinking of trying a seed or too.

Also, I had previously read reports our native jewelweed (Impatiens capensis) shoots being a marginal edible but I wonder if the seeds can be used if found in abundance?

[blueadzuki]

Aug 13, 2010 15:30:18 GMT -5 ottawagardener said:

Also, I had previously read reports our native jewelweed (Impatiens capensis) shoots being a marginal edible but I wonder if the seeds can be used if found in abundance?

Even if they could, I probably wouln't do it, the juice of the Jewelweed is so damn handy as a topical anesthetic to soothe insect bites, bee stings, and encounters with nettles (who they are often found groiwng right next to) that the more of those seeds are around to germinate (and hence the more plants that are around), the happier clumsy, blundering me is!!

[robertb]

I've spent too much time trying to get Himalayan Balsam before it seeds to want to encourage the stuff to produce them! The way it sprays them around they wouldn't be easy to harvest effectively.

[mjc]

Aug 13, 2010 18:00:42 GMT -5 robertb said:

I've spent too much time trying to get Himalayan Balsam before it seeds to want to encourage the stuff to produce them! The way it sprays them around they wouldn't be easy to harvest effectively.

The trick to capturing seeds for any members of the impatiens family is to bag the plant once it blooms, but before the seed pods mature. A net bag (small mesh) over the whole thing, then when the pods start popping, just cut the plant off, hang upside down for a day or so to get even more to pop...then shake it to collect the seeds into a bottom corner...the remove the plant and dump out your seed collection.

I've done that with jewelweed a couple of times and it worked very well. I've also done it with garden impatiens I was playing with crossing.

[seedywen]

Ahhh...the big plant with the nickname from the biblical Latin phrase Noli me tangere which appears in John 20:17 translated as "Touch me not".

Having lots of room on the farm, this plant is an annual favorite of mine. Actually collected seeds about ten years ago from a neighbour who gave me a strict warning about the plant's ability to shoot out its seeds. Planted it and never saw a plant emerge until about five years later.

In recent years, I started receiving email bulletins about how invasive a species this plant is, in water-ways and wet-lands. Started wondering about my rather cavalier love of this plant. However...get this.

Himalayan Balsam is NO match...for the Himalayan Blackberry!!!!

The two of them duked it out of the edges of my garden and the ravine to the creek below. The Balsam disappeared.

Often I pull up the balsam when the seeds are ripe and feed the whole plants to my goats. Of course, dozens of seeds 'pop' in the process, ensuring the garden will not lack for new plants next year. Given the plant's shallow root system, just pull them out wherever not desiring them to grow and leave a bunch to tower in the borders until pull time.

The plants give my garden a lush 'tropical' look especially as other perennials blend in beautifully with their orchid like flowers.
I grow them in the background among the early flowering shrubs and summer climbing clematis which amble over the same shrubs.

Sometimes if the plant gets too tall, just nip out the main flowering stem and leave the side shoots. The bees love the blossums. In the evening, the flowers give off a light perfume.

And get this!

In the morning, when I release the flocks of hungry chickens and ducks, some of them, run and peck to eat, the Himalayan Balsam flowers. However never knew until this thread, that people actually harvested the seeds/pods for curry.

Survival or gourmet food!

[ottawagardener]

As I said, I am not intentionally planting it. I was just intrigued by this use and wondered if the native species could be similarly used. The people that made the curry that I linked too seemed to have managed to harvest sufficient amounts - I have to say that my kids are pretty motivated to initiate seed capture or is that release?

[atash]

I have a wild Impatiens on my farm. Not sure of the species; it has flowers colored like those of I. capensis, strangely rather small ones, and leaves that are slightly lobed. Maybe just a variant of I. capensis, which is not too uncommon here.

I. glandulifera is abundantly naturalized here but the state has been attacking and eradicating it. I don't mind it; it's prettier than a lot of other plants that grow in drainage ditches.

I have I. arguta in my yard. If you ever plant this, get the UPRIGHT version, not the silly spreading one like I have, whose large deep purple flowers are hard to spot, being too low to the ground.

Also I. omeiensis.

I once grew the gorgeous I. namchabawensis, which has BLUE, yes BLUE flowers. Alas although a native of Tibet, it grows in the extremely sheltered Tsangpo gorge, and like other BLUE Impatiens is not at all coldhardy. I did not realize that when I planted it, and promptly lost it. If I ever grew it again, I'd take cuttings for the winter. It roots easily at any joint.

(I have a thing for blue flowers. BLUE not purple. Roses are red and violets are PURPLE. Blue flowers are things like Gentians (especially the ones that are hard to grow ), Tecophilea cyanocrocus, Meconopsis x sheldonii, Cypella coelestris, a few Pennstemons and Lobelias (the more exotic ones), and things like that).

[ottawagardener]

I love blue too atash - gentian is one of my favourite flowers. I also grow False Indigo, lobelia often and other blues. I'll have to check out some of the impatiens out of curiousity now.

I have seen I. capensis with lobed leaves before if memory serves me correctly. I'll have to snap some photos of wild ones when I see them.

[seedywen]

If you like blue flowering perennials, tried growing
large Blue Alkanet. a member of the borage family (Boraginaceae).

Got a plant last fall and have thoroughly enjoyed its blue bloom from March until now, August. Some sources suggest cutting the plant close to the ground after the main flowering to prevent the plant from spending itself as it may not come back the following year.

On the other hand, left to flower the alkanet seems to be loaded with seeds, very similiar to borage. So I compromised.

Half cut the plant, hoping for both a return next year and some seeds. Really like the idea of having a perennial blue flower in the garden with such a long bloom time.

[ottawagardener]

That's one I want to try actually! Thanks for the reminder. What variety do you have?

[castanea]

For blue flowers, try California bluebells:

www.flickr.com/photos/clairewoods/3632692570/

[atash]

Aug 14, 2010 10:16:05 GMT -5 castanea said:

For blue flowers, try California bluebells:

www.flickr.com/photos/clairewoods/3632692570/

Yes, you're right, those are very blue and very striking. I can grow them, and I have some years, but they don't seem to reseed in my climate very well; I get a few but eventually they die out. Probably try to germinate in the fall and then freeze to death in the winter. I have a climate that has a Mediterranean rainfall pattern, but quite a bit colder, down to about -10C or so.

My farm is in a location that has a very pretty native blue-flowered bulb, and they grow along the road in front of my farm, but there are none on the farm itself. I'd like to get some established.

Ottowagardner, you're probably right, just plain old I. capensis. The lobed leaves threw me off because I'd never seen that before.

I'd like to save some of its seeds. I like wild impatiens...and so do the hummingbirds.

While you're looking up Impatiens, have a look at I. tinctoria. Big shrubby species from Africa, with big FRAGRANT flowers. The name implies that it is a source of dye--I think the seed pods. Sort of coldhardy here if the big fat roots get established before winter hits.

Have a look at Annies Annuals selection of Impatiens. She has a lot of species Derrick Pitman has collected.

www.mrimpatiens.com/

India seems to be the land of blue impatiens. Impatiens seem to be commonest in India and Africa. India broke off from Africa a couple hundred million years ago. I. namchabawensis is an outlier that lives at the bottom of the Tsangpo Gorge not all that far away from India. The low elevation, the ability of warm humid air to flow up the gorge, and the world's highest mountain chain blocking cold fronts makes the air temperature surprisingly mild. The flower color will vary but good acidic soil will encourage a bluer flower.

[ottawagardener]

Atash: You just solved a mystery for me. Apparently, the bicolour flower Impatiens that I grow (really, restrict) is Impatiens balfourii.

[robertb]

I discovered how invasive Himalayan Balsam was when I was a kid; it grew everywhere along the banks of the Wye, swamping everything else in the damp spots. I came across it again when I got my allotment, mistook it for an attractive weed, and almost had my veg smothered the following year. Fortunately it's easy to pull out. The seeds are short-lived, and I've found that if it's completely exterminated one year, it doesn't come back the next.

[seedywen]

The variety of Alkanet, is likely Italian Bugloss, Anchusa azurea as the plant grew to five feet tall and needed staking.

Also called, Lingua-de-vaca.(tongue of the cow?)