EXOTIC PLANTS

by David Nuttle

Exotic plants of the world make significant contribution to mankind. To wit:

1) Myrrh (Commiphora myrrha) trees love to grow on hot desert sands & produce a resin having about the same value as gold since Biblical times. The resin is used to make valued medicinal and perfume products. When this resin is burned it produces an oily smoke used to cover livestock for insect control. In some areas, people use this resin burning practice to cover themselves with such oily smoke to protect from insect bites.

There is an ancient Myrrh tree plantation in Kenya (about 3,000 acres of trees) along the Somalia border. I spent 5-days with Somali Myrrh resin tappers working this plantation. The sand in this area is about 20 ft. deep over a layer of limestone rock. I was told annual rainfall was only about 3-inches total. Heat at noon was 120 degrees F. Myrrh trees have a heavy waxy covering to protect from heat but are known to not tolerate freezing temperatures. The Myrrh resin tappers I was with sold four bags of resin, packed on camels, for over $50,000.

2) Spirulina algae (Athrospira platensis) has been scientifically proven to be the world's most perfect food with just the right blend of proteins, vitamins, minerals, and polyphenolics. It is no longer exotic and is being grown commercially and sold as a health food and used in an assortment of food products. Historical research indicates the Inca and Astec populations harvested wild Spirulina, dried it in the sun, and then blended it with four made from a Grain Amaranth. It is believed that this is why these populations were known to be very healthy. NPI will be growing Spirulina algae in its innovative tubal-algalculture system as part of its desert crop production using NPI's advanced counter-desertification technologies.

3) Facai/ Fa Cai (Nostoc fasciatus) is a blue-green cyanobacterium that grows in a thick green to nearly black colored, hair-like mat on high desert sands, mostly in the PRC (China). It has long been harvested and consumed for its excellent taste and high nutritional value. Now, it is illegal for the Chinese to harvest because of typically being removed roots and all that resulted in lost desert cover crop and more blowing sands. PRC's Academy of Sciences is seeking ways to grow Facai commercially as a valued vegetable crop. Facai is known to produce its own nitrogen and obtain needed moisture from humidity found in night skies over most desert lands.

4) Gympie-Gympie/ Kpung (Dendrocnide moroides) grows wild in the jungles of Vietnam and used by some Montagnard tribal villages as a hedge-type security fence. Leaves of this plant have a highly toxic, barbed hair on the under-side of leaves. Skin contact with leaves soon causes intense pain and rapid swelling of the area such barbs have attached to. One of my Special Forces A-Team members made contact with this plant on a jungle patrol and soon experienced the above symptoms. A Montagnard on this patrol quickly contacted a local Montagnard succorer who made an herbal paste he applied to said victim in order to quickly neutralize the Kpung toxin.

There are many exotic plants on our planet that we have just been learning about. Work on this such research needs to continue with some priority.