Maca – Lepidium meyenii – is a tasty little root vegetable that is very hard to come by. It grows natively in the high Andes on the altiplano. There is all sorts of info available out there about this plants medicinal uses but little about how to grow it and the seed is still fairly hard to come by. So far I have been quite successful in getting seed to germinate and then grow the plants to flowering and now am working on building up numbers for seed saving etc. I’m guessing it’s a combination of the weather and UV light, length of day etc here at about 1000metres in the mountains. Usually it would be growing at 3000m or higher with a very complex weather pattern to imitate out of it’s normal growing areas.

The plant is a biennial  and a lot like a flattened carrot, radish or similar root vegetable but grows very flat and low to the ground level. Even when growing large in a pot it seems to be hard to see. I would imagine it would be nigh on invisible from even a small distance in it’s native environment.

The tap root is like a flattened radish and mine have been mostly a light brown/orange colour all over.

I am growing it in pots generally but am about to start moving it into the ground this 2013 winter season for a trial.

One trick I have found is keeping the water levels steady and very carefully protecting the plant during summer so it does not get too hot and wet at the same time and especially not wet during it’s dormant phase. I would count the hot temps of Summer as it’s dormant phase from my experience so far as it grows fine all through our autumn, winter and spring.

I think it’s very similar to growing carrots, turnips or parsnips where having a fairly nitrogen depleted soil is desirable.

It is also easier to carefully manage the nutrients as well in a pot. They seem to like a basic level of a good selection manure etc but not too much – especially if it holds moisture around the tap root. I’m guessing the usual natural situation is a having a depleted basic fast draining mountains soil but then with nutrients added for the growing season which are then eventually used or washed out again by snow melt etc. References like ‘Lost Crops of the Incas’ talk about maca being grown on a rotational basis with the best fields for the season being dedicated to it.

The taste when roasted is quite spectacular – however getting enough to start eating them is hard work.

I have just planted outside in small pots and successfully germinated this seasons seeds over the last three weeks of May. The low temps down around 10c degrees and bright sunny UV filled days seem to help a lot with this.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lepidium_meyenii

This is another plant listed in the great classic Andes Research book ‘The lost crops of the Incas‘ under ‘Maca‘.