Cynomorium songaricum Seeds | Maltese Mushroom
LATIN NAME: Cynomorium songaricum
COMMON NAME: Maltese Mushroom
Plant Profile
Known to gardeners as Maltese Mushroom, Cynomorium songaricum is a shrub in the cynomorium family. Maltese mushroom is strange, red club of salt flats, rising from sand like a figure from another world. Strange, fleshy, parasitic plant sends up upright, club-shaped, dark-red to purple-brown stems from sand, bearing dense, scale-like heads through spring, and thick stems have a very long record in old practice of the East. Plant is a fine, curious presence of desert garden and study border. When it flowers, local bees and other insects make good use of it. Together these qualities explain its long-standing appeal to gardeners.
Science & Biotechnology
Suo yang is a fleshy, non-photosynthetic parasite of desert roots, dark red-brown and long traded across the Silk Road as a tonic for virility and dry constipation. Its chemistry — anthocyanins, triterpenes and phenolic acids — shows antioxidant and androgen-modulating activity in animal models, and it often appears alongside Cistanche in classical formulas, an ecological and pharmacological pairing of two desert parasites. Wild populations have been heavily collected, making cultivated supply the responsible choice.
Botanists studying the cynomorium family regularly include Cynomorium songaricum in comparative work, and the species also appears in horticultural trials aimed at gardeners and growers. In practice, its long garden history means the grower inherits a plant of known and dependable habits.
Uses & Benefits
Beyond its ornamental appeal, Maltese Mushroom has the practical versatility that makes a plant worth growing from seed year after year. Maltese mushroom is a strange and valuable plant of desert edge. Plant is one of great wild medicines of desert, and wild stands are best left to care of conservation work, with plant grown under careful hand of the growers. It has been written up in botanical and conservation papers for red clubs and the very long record of use, and it is a fine, curious plant of the open, sunny, very well-drained garden. Getting it going is easy; keeping it going is easier still.
Cynomorium, Suo Yang, is a fleshy desert parasite prized in Chinese and Mongolian medicine as a yang tonic; its flavonoids and polysaccharides are studied for effects on energy and reproductive function.
Growing from Seed
Seed is the natural starting point for Maltese Mushroom, and the process is uncomplicated. Sow on the surface of a gritty, well-drained mix, cover lightly with fine compost, and maintain gentle, even moisture in a sunny position. Shift the seedlings into small pots as soon as they can be handled, and give them bright light until planting-out time.
Our Take
Maltese Mushroom settles in quickly once it finds its footing. Give the seed freshness and steady moisture, and nature handles the rest.
Related Reading
Gardeners who grow Maltese Mushroom often pair it with these related subjects: