Crops Meadowfoam (Limnanthes alba)

Summary Information



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Plot before flowering

The meadowfoam plant is a weakly-rooted, herbaceous winter annual which develops in a rosette form.

Young plant

The leaves are long-stemmed and subdivided into pairs of oval leaflets; they are bright green in colour and usually covered with a shiny wax layer during the winter months.

Cluster of buds

Buds are produced in hairy clusters at the ends of special stems which arise directly from the rosette, in late spring; these flowering stems rarely exceed 40 cm in height.

Flowers

The flowers have 5 white petals and are delicately scented: in bright sunshine, an area of meadowfoam plants may be virtually covered in blossom when the plants are in full bloom.

Ripe nutlets

The seeds are held within the sepals, in groups of usually 3 nutlets, which ripen quickly to a mid- brown colour (often striped or mottled) and are then shed. Methods of growing the crop reliably have proved difficult to define, since climatic variations seem to have considerable effects on yield levels. Land with a high water table or good water-holding capacity is essential, since drought at any stage is likely to result in severe or total loss of yield. Sowing is best about mid-October: a high plant density is desirable, of the order of 400 plants per square metre, which requires a seedrate of about 30 kg per ha, in narrow rows (10-15 cm). Some herbicides may be crop-safe: applications of nitrogen fertiliser in excess of 50 kg per ha may impair both seed yield and quality. Timing of harvest is critical to avoid losses due to shedding; swathing before maturity, and the use of a stripper-header, have both been successful. Yields are variable, between 0.3-1.8 t seed per ha, with an average of perhaps 0.8 t per ha. Recent breeding work has concentrated on hybridisation with related species in order to reduce dependence on pollinating insects and so improve yield stability, which is a prerequisite if commercial interest is to be sustained.