Snake hair cucumber
| Snake hair cucumber | ||||||||||||
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Snake hair cucumber ( Trichosanthes cucumerina ) |
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| Trichosanthes cucumerina | ||||||||||||
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The snake- haired cucumber ( Trichosanthes cucumerina ), also called snake cucumber , Chinese cucumber or snake gourd , is a useful plant from the cucurbitaceae family that is widely cultivated in the tropics and subtropics .
The snake- haired cucumber should not be confused with the cucumber ( Cucumis sativus ), the elongated varieties of which are sometimes also referred to as snake cucumbers .
features
The snake- haired cucumber forms long lianas with palmately lobed, densely hairy leaves and branched tendrils .
The flowers are large, white, frayed, fragrant and open at night. The male flowers are in clusters , the female are solitary, but occur on the same plant. So the snake cucumber is monoecious . The fruits are egg-shaped tapering to a long, narrow, snake-like shape, up to 150 cm long and eponymous for the species. Unripe fruits are green with white stripes and turn orange to red when ripe. Brown seeds sit in the white, fibrous flesh. Older fruits become bitter.
The chromosome number is 2n = 22 or 44.
distribution
The home of the species is believed to be in India . Today it is grown in the humid subtropics and tropics of Australasia, Latin America and Africa and is also wild there.
Systematics
The refined form, Trichosanthes cucumerina var. Anguina (L.) Haines , formerly often as a separate species Trichosanthes anguina L. performed. However, it can be freely crossed with the wild form and genetically hardly differentiated from it.
Cultivation and use
The snake hair cucumber is sensitive to dry soil. It is therefore usually grown at the beginning of the rainy season. Temperatures constantly above 25 ° C and short day lengths are advantageous. The lianas are attached to trellises or other supports. Stones are sometimes hung on the young fruits at the flower end in order to get straight fruits. The fruits are harvested two to three months after cultivation with a length of 30 to 60 cm.
Young, unripe fruits are used before they become bitter. They are cooked or used in curries . Shoot tips and leaves are used as vegetables, roots and seeds as medicine. The areas of application include worm control, diarrhea , bronchitis and fever.
literature
- RW Robinson, DS Decker-Walters: Cucurbits . CAB International, Wallingford 1997, pp. 109-110, ISBN 0-85199-133-5 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ BEE Duyfjes, K. Pruesapan: The genus Trichosanthes L. (Cucurbitaceae) in Thailand . In: Thai Forest Bulletin 32, 2004, pp. 76-109, ( online ( Memento from May 4, 2010 in the Internet Archive ))
- ↑ a b N.M. Nayar, R. Singh: Taxonomy, Distribution and Ethnobotanical Uses . In: NM Nayar, TA More: Cucurbits . Science Publishers, Enfield 1998, pp. 1-18, ISBN 1-57808-003-7