spinegrout

Kantola  Spine Gourd 

Kantola is uncommon vegetable that is use in Indian cuisine and South Asian cuisine. Until recent times it was a part of rural meal during monsoon seasons. Now recently It was identified as very healthy food that provide so many health benefits.      

Some of the health benefits of Spine Gourd are as follows.

·         Spine gourd reduces blood sugar level.

·         Spine gourd work as anti-aging.

·         Spine gourd Improves eyesight.

·         Spine gourd reduces the chances of cancer

·         Spine gourd removes kidney stones.

·         Spine gourd is home remedy to cure piles.

·         Spine gourd reduces excess sweating.

·         Spine gourd treats coughing.

·         Spine gourd may improve digestion.

 

Cultivating Kantola  as a crop is profitable

Hear some of the cultivation tips

Its scientific name is Momordica dioica, commonly known as spiny gourd or spine gourd.

It can grow in tropical climatic condition in well drain soil with lot of organic matter and sand. Its wild grown type grow its vegetative greens and create fruits and tuber during monsoons and then vegetative part die due to dry climatic condition but life remain in tuber that flourish back with next monsoon season.

This lifecycle is used in agriculture to make planting materials. In Kantola cultivation you can use three kind of planting materials

1.       Kantola tubers  ( previous year grown tuber)

2.       Kantola Seeds

3.       Kantola Cutting propagated plants

There are plus and minus in these planting materials

1.       Kantola tubers

Grow fast and produce fruits soon than other planting materials. But it is difficult to find planting materials for commercial cultivation by this method. And you have to separate male and female planting materials during growing season because you can’t identify male and female tubers by looking at it.

2.       Kantola Seeds

Kantola seeds has very long germination time period some seeds can retain life in soil more than one year and most of the seeds germinate within two weeks but critical factor is you can determine gender of the plant from the seeds. And most of the seed plants are male that is my experience. Last but not least Kantola seed plants take longest time to make fruits that is negative aspect but you can find seeds easy than finding other two planting materials that is another advantage.

3.       Kantola cutting propagated plant

This is the best planting material based on these factors. You can have male and female plants based on gender by obtaining cuttings from best  male and female plants. When you take cuttings from mature plant cutting also show mature qualities such as producing flowers soon than seed plants. Last factor is you can have required amount of planets easily by cuttings within short period of time. Most important thing is you can have is identical plants that show best qualities because you take vegetative materials rather than seeds.

 

Now you have clear picture about planting materials but now you might have new question “what is male and female plant?” Kantola is dioecious plant that mean one  kantola plant only contain one kind of flower that male or female.

 

 

 

Male plant

Male Kantola plants bear flowers with male organs only. that call stamen that consist of filament and anther. Anther is part that contain pollen. Interesting part of this plants is in order to have fruits you need to cultivate minimum two plants one male and female one. Only female plant bear fruits.

 

                                                                           Male flower

Female plant

Female plants bear flowers with female organs only .  female organs of the flower call carpels.  Female part of the flower consist stigma pollen receptacle, style that connect stigma and ovary, ovary that contain seeds.

                                                                     Female flower

Thee female flowers get pollinated by pollens of the male flower naturally by insects. But this dose not  happen often. That create low yield when cultivate. Their for these flowers need to pollinate artificially by hand.

Artificial pollinated flowers will create fruits as follows.

Kantola Spiny gourd propagation

Kantoal is one of  our traditional vegetable in Local context it is known as Thumba karavila. Scientifically Kantola call as (Momordica dioica), commonly known as spiny gourd or spine gourd. this vegetable is famed for its medicinal properties. specially Kantoala vegetable can control blood sugar level. 

	Nutrient	weight
1	Moisture	84.1g
2	Carbohydrate	7.7g
3	Protein	3.1g
4	Fat	3.1g
5	Fiber	3g
6	Mineral	1.1g
7	ascorbic acid, carotene, thiamin, riboflavin and niacin	Small quantities

it has very nice life cycle. 

if you want to cultivate this plant you can 

1. sow seeds
2. propagate from mature vine cutting 
3. plant dormant  tubers

Sow seeds take long time for germinate in natural condition. if you treat seeds by warm water soaking over night period seeds will germinate within 3 to 5 days time. Seeds can remain dormant more than one year live. but generally some seeds germinate after around one month natural condition. negative factor of this method is you cant determine plant gender. Kantola naturally bear only one kind of flowers ether male or female. in order to have fertile crop you will need both male and female vine in 1 to 8 ratio. when you plant seed plants you cant do it because at early age you cant differentiate male plant from female plant both are same morphological. 

Kantola Seed Plant 

propagate from mature vine cutting

Kantoala can propagate from mature vine cuttings. by this methods you can obtain good plant stock based on production performance and tolerance to natural factors. most important factor is you can have both male and female plants in required numbers.

first select parent plants and select vine that is not very old and not very immature. this selected vine need to cut into peaces that contain three leaf knots with leafs and remove one leaf. then make a angle cut at the lower end of the stem cutting and apply a rooting hormone to induce rooting. ( you can plant without rooting hormone if you like) then plant prepared stem cutting in small pot. and leave it in a propagator for 21 days and then acclimatize small plants to natural condition. this is call hardening. then you can plant in field.   

Plant dormant tubers 

Kantoala vine produce a sub soil tuber when it get mature and then die during the dry season and when next rain season come this tuber sprout and new vine comes out. some farmers use this dormant tubers for propagation. if this tubers not get infected by any deices then this tubers give strong plants that will bear fruits sooner than other two planting materials. and if you are properly remove the tubers then you can have male and female tubers separate.