Cultivation techniques of curculigo

Xianmao, also known as ground brown and monocross, is a commonly used Chinese herbal medicine with the effect of warming kidney yang, strengthening muscles and bones, treating impotence, urinary incontinence, collapse and leakage, heart and belly cold pain, waist and foot cold arthralgia, carbuncle gangrene, Yang deficiency cold diarrhea, impotence, waist and knee wind cold, muscle and bone impotence and other diseases. Xiancao is mainly produced in southern Sichuan, Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangxi, Zhejiang, Jiangxi, Fujian, Taiwan, Hunan and Guangdong.

Morphological characteristics

Perennial herbs. Rhizome elongated, up to 30 cm long, cylindrical, fleshy, bark brown; roots stout, fleshy, aboveground stems inconspicuous. Leaves 3-6-rooted, narrowly lanceolate, 10-25 cm long, apex acuminate, stalk down, and then expanded downward into a sheath, 4-10 cm long, green-white, margin membranous; leaf veins conspicuous, with midrib; both surfaces sparsely villous, then gradually smooth. Flowers axillary; pedicels 1 × 2.5 cm long, hidden in leaf sheaths; flowers polygamous, upper male flowers lower bisexual flowers; bracts lanceolate, green, membranous, villous; flowers ca. 1 box in diam., perianth lower slender tubular, ca. 2 cm or longer, distally 6-lobed, lobes lanceolate, 8 × 12 mm long, inner surface yellow, white outside, villous; stamens 6, filaments short; ovary narrowly long, villous. Berry ellipsoid, slightly fleshy, ca. 1.2 cm, apex beaked, villous, seeds slightly globose, bright black, beaked, surface wavy grooves. The florescence is from June to August.

I. growth habits

Like warmth, resistant to shade and drought, wild in hillsides or sparse forests and bushes, and grow well in sandy soil with good drainage, loose soil and rich in humus.

II. Land selection and land preparation

The wasteland should be turned over in the winter of the first year, raked twice in the spring of the second year, leveled and broken up, and picked up wood roots, weeds and stones. On the other hand, the cooked land was ploughed and prepared one month before planting. A few days before planting, compost was applied per mu and 1500kg / mu of turf ash was used as base fertilizer. Shallow rake again, from 120 cm wide and high border.

Third, sowing seeds

Curculigo can be propagated by seed and rhizome. Seed propagation is that the fruits hidden in the leaf sheath are collected in September every year, and the seeds are rubbed out in a moist fine sand storage room for sowing from March to April of the following year. After the seedlings are unearthed, the management should be strengthened, weeds should be pulled out in time, fertilizer and drainage should be applied properly. After two years of cultivation, the seedlings can be planted. If the rhizome is propagated, when harvesting (or harvesting wild) curcuma, the rhizome with strong growth and no disease and insect pests is selected as the seed, and the selected seed stem is cut into 2 cm long segments to raise seedlings. After emergence, weeding and fertilization management should be carried out in time, and it can be planted after 1-2 years of cultivation.

Curculigo can be planted from October to November every year to March of the following year. On the whole planting field, it is planted according to the distance between the rows of plants 15 cm and the depth of the hole 10 cm. The seedlings of 3-4 plants in each hole are evenly placed, compacted with soil and drenched with water.

IV. Field management

In the first year of planting, the seedlings were ploughed and weeded for the first time after returning to green, and then a shallow ploughing was carried out every quarter, and the weeds between plants should be pulled out by hand. Topdressing was carried out 3-4 times a year, the first and second times combined with intermediate tillage and weeding, applying 1000-1500 kg of human and animal manure per mu, the third intermediate ploughing and weeding from July to September, and 2000 kg of stable manure and turf ash per mu. Those with sufficient fertilizer can apply winter fertilizer again from November to December, applying 2000 kg of turf ash and compost per mu. Curculigo is a shade-loving plant, which can interplant soybeans, mung beans, beans and vegetables in the planting land, which can not only shade curculigo, benefit growth, but also increase economic benefits.

V. harvesting and processing

After planting for two years, the plant withered from October to November and could be harvested before sprouting in the early spring of the following year. When harvesting, dig up the whole plant, shake off the soil, remove the residual leaves and fibrous roots, and spread out in the sun to dry or dry to become a commodity.

Commodity specifications and quality standards: unified goods, dry feet, thick strips, fleshy, cylindrical, slightly curved, brown or dark brown skin. The root stem is hard, the cross section is flat, the meat is light brown or brown, slightly spicy aroma, slightly pungent taste. No need for roots, impurities, no moth and mildew.