Moringa hildebrandtii seeds

Moringa hildebrandtii seeds

As a member of the family of Moringaceae this bottle tree grows rapidly to a size of about twenty meters with one meter in diameter of the trunk. The pinnately leaves have some coloured stalks which are red to deep red during the young age of a plant. The trunk of the tree is coloured white and formed like a bottle and in it the plant stores water. Because of its thicker bottom and the upper thin growing trunk it looks like a bottle, which is the reason for its name. Blossoms of this tree are small and white or cream-coloured. It is growing very fast, so it is one of the species which could be gained as Bonsai trees. Originally it was growing in the southwest of Madagascar, where it was planted by the native people there to mark the graves of kings after their regency. Even today the "miracle tree" still decorates most of the graves there.

The sowing of the seeds can be done during the whole year at a stable temperature of about 22 to 25 degrees in a mixture of soil and humus or perlite or sand with a relation of one part of soil and two parts of humus. Germination time for this species is about two to four weeks and the seedlings are growing very fast until now. It is important to make sure the plant is getting a lot of sunlight now. The soil should always be humid during the summer months with adding water about two or three times per week. In winter the soil should not be dry but can also be humid, pouring is only necessary when the soil is completely dry.

Even in winter the temperature should not fall below 17 degree. The origin of its name leads back to Heinrich Gustav Adolf Engler, who entitled it in 1902 like the botanist Hildebrandt, who first collected this species in 1880.