On the site here, and at The Moringa Home Page, I talk a lot not only about “moringa” Moringa oleifera, but also about the other 12 species of the genus. This is bewildering—which one should you grow and use for your intended application? The short answer is Moringa oleifera, no contest. Though we are still studying the other species, all research shows that M. oleifera hands down wins out over the other species in terms of leaf nutritional yield and quality, antioxidant activity, potential glucose regulatory activity, antibacterial qualities, growth rate, leaf and fruit yield, oil edibility and quality, and a host of other aspects of interest. So that’s the short answer: all evidence points to using M. oleifera for any given application. If you want more detail, keep reading!
A lot of people write to ask which species is the best one for their purposes, so I thought a post on the subject might be of interest to many moringaphiles.
On the site here, and at The Moringa Home Page, I talk a lot not only about “moringa” Moringa oleifera, but also about the other 12 species of the genus. This is bewildering—which one should you grow and use for your intended application? The short answer is Moringa oleifera, no contest. Though we are still studying the other species, all research shows that M. oleifera hands down wins out over the other species in terms of leaf nutritional yield and quality, antioxidant activity, potential glucose regulatory activity, antibacterial qualities, growth rate, leaf and fruit yield, oil edibility and quality, and a host of other aspects of interest. So that’s the short answer: all evidence points to using M. oleifera for any given application. If you want more detail, keep reading!
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A moringa collaborator, Scott Macbeth, PhD Student in Plant Sciences and CUNY Lehman College and the New York Botanical Garden, recently wrote to me asking about Donaldsonia stenopetala, the original name for Moringa stenopetala, and who Donaldson was. This inspired me to dig out the original description, which is worth a read and I thought I would post it here.
You sometimes see references to there being 14 species of moringa. On my web page and publications, I say there are 13. What gives? The idea that there are 14 species comes from Bernard Verdcourt's fine 1985 synopsis of the family. On pp. 22-23, he notes that
"A sterile specimen collected in northern Kenya shows resemblances both to M. ruspoliana but has bipinnate not simply pinnate leaves and to M. longituba but with different venation. The exact locality is known so that more material should be obtainable. A brief description is given. Plant reported to have a massive underground rootstock which develops a slender vertical stem. Leaves in a rosette at ground level, bipinnate, about 30 cm long; pinnae in 3 pairs; axes pubescent; petiole over 7 cm long; leaflets 5-7, + oblong, 5-7-5 x 2-8-45 cm, truncate to slightly emarginate at the apex and with a minute recurved thickened apiculus, rounded to subcordate at the base, drying pale grey-green, not very thin, minutely scabrid-pubescent above, shortly pubescent beneath on the characteristically raised whitish reticulate venation; petiolules 1-5 mm long. Flowers said to be yellow. KENYA. Northern Frontier Province: 32 km E of Wajir on road to Wajir Bor, open Acacia-Commiphora bushland on reddish sand, 185 m, 1 June 1977, Gillett 21313 (EA, K):- vernac. name 'wamo' (Som.)." Intriguing! Leaves in a rosette at ground level? Big fuzzy leaflets and raised venation? Yellow flowers? Nothing else like that was known in the family. I pictured something like this: Moringas grow fast when given the chance and put up with a lot in the meantime. Here is one story about Moringa drouhardii. I collected seed in southeastern Madagascar in 1997. I planted the seeds in 1998 in a greenhouse in California, while studying the way that moringa stem anatomy changes in development (see Olson and Rosell 2006 and Olson 2007). The plants would grow up to the ceiling so we would whack them back nearly to ground level every year (see the two photos below). After years and years of this treatment, the poor plants keep gamely growing back, but got a series of collars on the stem from the pruning scars. I took one such Moringa drouhardii to Mexico in 2006, after about 5 years of brutal pruning, and I kept it in my yard in Mexico City. Mexico City is at over 2000 meters above sea level. Moringa drouhardii survives there, but they are not happy. The plant leafed out every year and would grow about 5 cm. Finally, in 2010 I planted it in the ground here at sea level in Jalisco in September 2011. It was already a big fat tree 6 months later. These plants are now flowering and we hope for seed soon. We'll keep you posted.
The adult leaves of Moringa peregrina are bluish, with small, often deciduous leaflets. Purveyors of moringa will tell you all sorts of stories to get you to buy their products. Many of them try to get you to buy their moringa pills by spinning stories of the Romans and the Egyptians anointing themselves with moringa oil or energizing themselves with dried moringa leaves not unlike the very pills they are selling. As often the case, these vendors haven't quite gotten the story right. The folks selling moringa pills and other products are selling Moringa oleifera, from India and Pakistan. The Romans and Egyptians used oil from Moringa peregrina, which is found from the Dead Sea area south on both sides of the Red Sea, around the southern Arabian Peninsula as well as in northern Somalia (but not, oddly, on Socotra). The vendors are in venerable company, though, given that the tradition of confusing Moringa peregrina and M. oleifera in the historical literature is a long one. In Caspar Bauhin's landmark 1623 Pinax Theatri Botanici, he mentions a mysterious lignum peregrinum ("foreign wood/tree") that "turns water blue." "Foreign tree" is probably a reference to what we now call Moringa peregrina. Linnaeus in his 1753 Species Plantarum implies that lignum peregrinum and what is now known as Moringa oleifera are one and the same. Most early European references to Moringa are most likely M. peregrina because of its longstanding presence in ancient Mediterranean cultures. There is abundant archaeological evidence of the use of M. peregrina in Egypt and around the ancient Mediterranean. For example, Brun 2000 notes: "Texts on perfume production are rare; most of what we know comes from Theophrastus's treatise De Sensibus, "On Odours," written at the end of the fourth century B.C.... he inventories the different types of oils used in perfumery. According to Theophrastus, oils were used as bases that could receive and retain the scents. [Moringa peregrina oil], extracted from nuts growing on bushes in the Syrian and Egyptian deserts, was the most valuable, being the least viscous and the most receptive [to absorbing perfume scents]." Lise Manniche's An Ancient Egyptian Herbal gives numerous ancient recipes for medicinal use of M. peregrina (though continuing the tradition of calling it by names that refer to M. oleifera).
Clapham and Rowley-Conwy (2007) give an interesting record of the presence of M. peregrina samples at Qasr Ibrim, once a major city in what is now Lake Nasser, Egypt. They show that traces of M. peregrina fruits are present over a period comprising as early as the 7th century BC to as late as 650 AD, a stunningly long period of documented use. Unlike Moringa oleifera, the leaves of M. peregrina are not eaten by people, though sometimes they are fed to livestock. The tubers of young plants are eaten roasted, at least in southern Arabia (see Miller and Morris 1988). But it is the seeds of M. peregrina that are of interest. They were used, and still are used in many places, to produce a medicinal and cosmetic oil. That process is a topic for another post. In the meantime, know that when a vendor tells you stories about the pharoahs and the emperors charged themselves with moringa energy, and that they can sell you the very same article, the pharaoahs did not have M. oleifera and you will not receive M. peregrina. References Bauhin, C. 1623. Pinax Theatri Botanici. Sumptibus & typis Ludovici Regis. Brun, J. P. 2000. The Production of Perfumes in Antiquity: The Cases of Delos and Paestum. American Journal of Archaeology 104: 277-308. Clapham, A. J., and P. A. Rowley-Conwy. 2007. New discoveries at Qasr Ibrim, Lower Nubia. Progress in African Archaeobotany, ed. R. Cappers, 157-164. Groningen Archaeological Studies 5. Linnaeus, C. 1753. Species Plantarum. Laurentius Salvius. Manniche, L. 1999. An Ancient Egyptian Herbal. British Museum Press. Miller, A. G., and M. Morris. 1988. Plants of Dhofar. Office of the Adviser for Conservation of the Environment, Diwan of the Royal Court, Sultanate of Oman. The Moringa longituba seeds planted on 12 September 2013 have all sprouted! Germination in all but M. drouhardii, M. hildebrandtii, and M. ovalifolia is cryptocotylar, that is, the cotyledons typically remain in the seed coat. As is usual in moringa germination, with plenty of bottom heat, a nice open potting mix, and pleny of water, these seeds all sprouted within a week. Below you can see that the first pair of leaves in Moringa longituba have three leaflets. Most tree moringas grow like crazy in height after germination. Not M. longituba. This species lives in an area with very little rain, which falls in two very short seasons. So when water is present, the plants sprout quickly, grow two or three leaves, and invest all the rest of their energies into growing a tuber. The leaves are short lived, and the plants die back to the tuber, riding out the dry season until the next rains fall. Let's wish these little guys well. |
AuthorDr. Mark E. Olson is a researcher at Mexico's national university and an expert on the biology of the genus Moringa Archives
November 2018
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