Harpagophytum procumbens Seeds | Devils Claw

Hooked, woody devil's claw fruit caught on dry sand beside trailing grey-green stems — Devil’s Claw (*Harpagophytum procumbens*): Pedaliaceae, the Kalahari and Karoo of southern Africa.

LATIN NAME: Harpagophytum procumbens

COMMON NAME: Devil’s Claw

Plant Profile

Devil’s claw is a desert geophyte, and the part that matters lies underground: a primary tuber the size of a turnip, from which radiate thinner storage roots that carry the plant through the dry season. The stems trail across red sand, the leaves are grey-green and lobed, and the flowers are large, pink and trumpet-shaped. The fruit is a woody capsule with long, hooked arms that catch in fur and skin, which is how the seed travels and how the plant got its name. Nothing about it looks like a medicine, which is part of why the trade in its roots has been so hard to regulate. The tuber lies thirty to sixty centimetres down, which is why harvesting is heavy work.

Science & Biotechnology

The harvested material is the secondary storage root, not the primary tuber, and that distinction is the basis of the sustainable-harvest rules in Namibia and Botswana: the lateral roots are lifted, part is returned to the hole, and the plant survives. Research on the species has therefore moved from pharmacology into harvest ecology, measuring regrowth after different intensities of digging and the time a population needs to recover. Seed biology is less studied but distinctive, since the hooked fruit is a dispersal mechanism and germination is improved by scarification and warm, wet conditions. Population genetics shows that harvested stands lose diversity faster than expected from their biomass alone. Trials in the Kalahari show that a dug plant can recover in three to five years if the primary tuber is replanted and the hole refilled.

Uses & Benefits

The bitter iridoid-rich roots are the commercial product, sold as dried slices and standardised extracts for joint and back discomfort, and the harvest supports rural incomes across the Kalahari. The plant itself has a place in a dry garden as a curious trailing perennial with showy flowers and remarkable fruit, and it is grown in pots in temperate climates. It is not a plant to dig from the wild, and cultivated or certified material is the only defensible source. Buyers increasingly ask for a harvest certificate, and that paperwork is the difference between a medicine and a hole in the desert. In Namibia the harvest is regulated by permit, and the slicing and drying is done locally, which keeps more of the value in the producing region.

Growing from Seed

Soak the seed for a few hours, then sow on the surface of a gritty, free-draining mix, cover lightly and keep at twenty-two to twenty-eight degrees with even moisture. Germination is erratic and can take two months. Grow the seedling in full sun and sharp drainage, in a deep pot that allows the tuber to form, and water generously in growth and hardly at all in dormancy. In cool climates it is a summer pot plant, dried off and kept frost-free through winter, with the tuber resting dry until March. Keep the crown of the tuber just at the surface, since deep planting rots it.

Our Take

A desert plant whose medicine is in its roots, and one that should be bought certified rather than dug. The tuber is the plant’s savings account; spend it and there is nothing left.

Herb Seeds