Subject: Re: [permaculture] passion fruit allelopathy
Date: Fri, 16 Feb 2007 00:31:01 EST
I live in Wake County North Carolina, and have the most obnoxious patch of
passion fruit you ever saw. In some areas of the planet it may control
weeds-- I
have no reason to doubt that in the tropics it may be allelopathic. And in
other regions it certainly constitutes a beautiful exotic, when introduced
for
its showy flowers and carefully tended.
But around my place it just smothers everything. Such vines as I want to keep
for ornament I have to train, so they don't strangle the other plantings.
Fortunately I don't need a machete, as the stuff is shallow rooted and comes
right up. But it has zero potential for controlling weeds. It can sprout amid
a
patch of healthy weeds and just head straight for the tree tops.
The fruit has a vaguely pleasant taste, although only a faint one (again, in
tropical regions the flavor may well be stronger). And the flowers, as I
said,
are fabulous. But otherwise, this is one of the Lord's useless creations.
Re: [permaculture] passion fruit allelopathy,
Marimike6, 02/16/2007