Rice plant growth comparison

This year I grew some forbidden black rice plants (Oryza sativa).  I don't know what I am doing when growing rice, and I am certainly not in their preferred climate, so it was all a bit of an experiment. 

Forbidden rice not yet ripe

There is not much advice available for backyard rice growers, so I had to largely work this out myself which is why I am writing this blog post.  

I had a few plants so thought I would do some comparisons, see what works better for me, and share the results.  Hopefully someone finds this useful.  

If nothing else, recording this here is useful for me in future years to remember what worked and what didn't.

Rice growing comparison

Rice plants comparison

Dry land rice compared to flooded rice

I am told that growing this variety of rice in shallow water is done mostly to control pests and weeds, and this variety of rice performs much the same in shallow water as it does in the vegetable garden.  Strangely I also read that shallow water grown rice tends to provide larger crops. 

I divided some of my rice plants, I planted one in a pot of soil in shallow water, the other is in a pot of soil.  Unfortunately this test was not overly great.  The soil used was the same, but the colour of the pot is different, as is the shape, and its volume, all of which may have an impact on growth of plants.  

I also had a few other rice plants in soil, and a few others in shallow water.  Some are in full sun, others part shade.  These two plants are growing side by side, and I figure it is easier to take photos of the same two plants time and again for comparison.

I took the first photo on 20 November 2025.  Both plants were reasonably similar in size and health.  

20 November 

While early, the growth after 6 days was noticeable.  These were grown in soil, the soil had a lot of weed seeds, and I was still getting on top of that at this stage.  

I pull out the weeds, and leave them on the soil surface to die and break down releasing nutrients back to the soil.  The one in shallow water did not have issues with grass and weed seeds germinating, the water took care of that for me.  From that perspective, shallow water grown rice was easier.

26 November 

Another week later, and it became pretty clear which plant was performing better in the short term.  

The plant in shallow water with azolla is noticeably taller.  The leaves are darker green, and the stem has more black colouration.  This is black forbidden rice, the black means it is high in anthocyanin.   

At this stage neither started tillering, and they were both far from flowering stage.  There was still a long time left to run with this little experiment but it was interesting to see such a dramatic difference so early.

6 December 

Black rice in shallow water with azolla

Black rice growing in soil

After another week the water grown rice was racing ahead.  It was too early to know if this would have any impact on the vigour of plants later in the season or the grain harvest at the end of the season.  

14 December 2025 

After a few months, in March 2026, I took the next set of comparison photos.  The situation had changed since the initial comparison photos.

The plant grown in shallow water had about 3 large tillers, and the soil grown had about 5 large tillers.  This may have been because the dry soil grown rice had a larger amount of soil, or it may be because this variety of rice performs better under dryland conditions, I don't know.  I only count the larger tillers as they can produce grain, they also had a number of smaller tillers.  

Interestingly, the water grown plant flowered and produced seed over a month earlier than the soil grown plant.  I'm not sure if there is enough heat left in the season for the soil grown plant to produce seed before the first frosts come.

Azolla comparison March 2026

It is noteworthy that I had azolla floating on the water in that first comparison.  If one grew better or worse than the other it may be due to the shallow water, or it may be due to the azolla.  

As I didn't know how much impact azolla would have, I also grew some rice plants side by side in shallow water, with and without azolla.  I only have a small number of plants, and limited space, so was not able to have many replicates of each.   

Growing rice in shallow water with and without azolla.  

I divided two similar sized rice plants on 29 November 2025.  The one without azolla was perhaps a little larger, and stronger.  It also was starting to tiller.  These two were as close in size and health as I could find.  While not perfectly identical, they were near enough.

I planted them in identical pots, in the same soil, and placed them in identical containers, and added water.  This comparison was better than the first one as the conditions for this were as identical as I could get them. 

The rice plant on the right is slightly larger - 29 November

I left these pots so the soil could settle for a while, both had roots under water and the leaves were in the air.  

Once they had settled in, I increased the depth of water, and added some azolla to one container.  I added quite a bit of azolla so I wouldn't have to wait long before it covered the water surface.  I didn't need to start with so much azolla, the azolla covered the water surface over the next few days, the growth rate of azolla is remarkable.  

One with azolla seems slightly smaller at the start

Once the plants grew a little I increased the depth of water to the top of the container.  From here I tried to keep the water topped up in both containers.  The water evaporates fast over summer, the one that did not have azolla evaporated much faster.  I did my best to keep both containers topped up.

You will notice the water without azolla also had a few algae blooms.  The water turned green and soupy for a while.  I don't think these blooms are great for plants, and I didn't notice many tiny things swimming among the algae.  When I parted the azolla the water underneath appeared clear and was teeming with tiny life.  While I don't know if this impacts the productivity of the rice plants, aesthetically having azolla and lots of tiny life is nicer.

Rice in shallow water - 06 December

Rice in shallow water with azolla - 06 December

Algae in the water that without azolla

Both plants similar size at this stage

One benefit to rice from azolla is that azolla sequesters nitrogen from the atmosphere, and puts it in a form that can be taken up by other plants.  This type of nitrogen fertiliser would be otherwise expensive to apply, where azolla does this organically and for free.  

I read a study https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12149377/ indicating azolla has more benefit to rice than simple nitrogen fertilisation, apparently it also acts as a 'biostimulant'.  We are only beginning to unravel this interaction, but it sounds like azolla is more promising than simply being an organic and free fertiliser.  

In that study, growing azolla with rice resulted in the accumulation of small peptides, lipids, and carbohydrates in rice roots, as well as flavonoid glycosides and carbohydrates in rice leaves.  Early research suggests that this may make the rice plants more vigorous and higher yielding.  That early research indicates not only does azolla increase the amount of rice grain produced, it may also make the grain more nutritious.  More research needs to be conducted in this field.

I am getting off track here, time to get back to the rice plant growing comparison.  About two weeks later, the algae bloom had cleared from the water, and both plants had grown noticeably.  The rice grown with azolla was taller, more lush, and beginning to develop more tillers.  It was still very early in this comparison.

Rice plants with and without azolla 19 December

This plant is growing well, but not as well as the one with azolla

Clear water, lots of growth, it is going well

Larger and healthier looking plant

The water without azolla eventually cleared, and stayed clear for the remainder of the growing season.  The other plant had azolla that grew into a thick azolla mat, the lower levels breaking down and releasing nutrients while the azolla on the surface continued to grow.

I had some issues with tiny birds getting into the greenhouse and messing with the azolla.  I don't know if they were eating it, or bathing in the water and splashing the azolla out, or searching for feed under it.  I made no attempt to stop them, I think having fairy wrens come into the greenhouse isn't a bad thing as they eat a lot of small insect pests.

In March 2026 I took the following comparison photos.  The azolla grown rice had 6 large tillers, while the non-azolla grown rice had 3 large tillers.  Each of these tillers could have eventually flowered and produced seed.

It is noteworthy that the plants with azolla had more tillers, and flowered several weeks before the ones grown in water without azolla.  

Azolla rice comparison March 2026

Shade grown rice compared to full sun

I had a few pots of rice growing in full sun, and I had some in part shade.  I wondered if in small pots perhaps rice would over heat and might do better under a little shade to keep the roots cooler.    

I didn't persist with this for very long as it became evident that rice growing in full sun was far larger and healthier than rice in part shade.  After a few weeks I moved the shade grown rice into more sun, and they almost caught up to the other plants.

I don't have any photos of the shade grown rice.  They were just small seedlings, they grew well once I moved them to an area with more sun. 

Rice seed heads forming in autumn

Rice Plant Growing Conclusion

While I got some seed from my rice growing experiment, all my rice plants struggled to produce a decent sized crop this year, I think there are a few reasons behind this.  

This summer, apart from a few days of extreme heat, was largely mild and dry.  We had very few tomatoes ripen this year, presumably due to lack of consistent heat.  I have a feeling if we had more consistent heat plus a bit more rain I may have been able to produce a better rice crop.  

The pots I grew the rice in were far too small.  If they had larger pots, they may have been better able to mature.  

I initially worried that the rice plants may not get enough sun in the greenhouse, but this didn't seem to be an issue.  The greenhouse grown plants didn't perform any worse than rice plants grown outside in full sun. 

Rice growing outside in full sun - not part of the comparison

When rice was grown on dryland, it initially performed worse than the submerged rice plants.  As time went on, the dryland rice caught up and grew better than the flooded rice - but dryland rice also had issues with pests. 

I had a large pot of soil with several rice plants that I did not take many photos of as I had no similar water grown comparison, I have a photo below of the end result.  

This rice was all killed by pests

Every rice plant in this pot was damaged by pests, and over time they all died.  It seems in my garden that slaters/wood lice have a taste for rice plants, and like to eat out their base.  I did not lose any of the flooded rice to pests, nor did I notice any pest damage to them at all.  In this sense, the flooded rice was better as it suffered no pest damage in my garden where everything is grown organically.  

Home grown rice performs best in full sun.  Growing in part shade did not do well.  This was not a great surprise.

Home grown rice in shallow water performed better with azolla than it did without azolla.  This was to be expected as it agrees with results from much research into growing rice with azolla.

 

Rice not yet ready

I only had a small number of plants this year, so this may be coincidence, but all of the rice grown in shallow water flowered and produced grain weeks before the dryland grown rice.  I expected the dryland rice to perform better as I had them in in pots with a larger volume of soil, but for unknown reasons they are the last to produce grain.

The rice plants grown in shallow water with azolla were the first to flower, followed several weeks later by the shallow water rice without azolla, while the dryland grown rice only began to flower in late April.  

Forbidden black rice seed heads forming

I am told that this rice is perennial if protected over winter.  I will try to protect some and see if any survives.  I will have some in shallow water (to insulate against temperature swings), and some in damp soil, and see how they go.  

Frosts are on the way, so I have moved all my rice plants into the greenhouse.  My rice plants are all yellowing from the cold.  I'm not sure if they will survive my winter.  Not everything survives winter in the greenhouse as it is still very cold in there over night, but it is worth a try.

  

Rice plants turning yellow in cooler weather

While my preference is for the rice plants to survive winter and to grow as perennials, I will also try to collect and store some seed to replant in Spring.  They produced hundred of seeds, so saving some of this shouldn't be an issue. 

Next year, if I grow black forbidden rice again, I plan to grow it in a few buckets of soil, or in large pots in buckets of water, similar to how I grow Chinese water chestnuts in buckets.  Given a larger amount of soil I think these plants would perform much better.  

Mulberry tree comparison

I love berry season, and one of the best tasting berries is the mulberry, which also happens to be one of the easiest to grow.  I currently grow three varieties of mulberry tree.  If I had space/water/time I would grow many more varieties, but for now I grow three varieties of mulberry. 

I currently grow two white mulberries (Morus alba), and one white shahtoot (Morus macroura).  I thought it was time to write a brief comparison of them. 

Mulberry variety comparison

The one on the left is a dark fruiting form of white mulberry, Morus alba.  I was told it was a black mulberry, or an 'English black mulberry', but it is not.  Even though it is not a black mulberry, it is a great little tree and has worked hard and earned a place in my garden. 

The one in the middle is another variety of white mulberry, this one is white-lavender fruited and is non-staining.  I've had this tree for a few years, it is now 15 to 20 feet tall.  I'm thinking of hacking it back in winter so the fruit is easier to reach.  

The one on the right is a white shahtoot.  White shahtoot is potentially a different species to the others,  Morus macroura, or it is a distinct long fruited form of white mulberry, or maybe it is a hybrid between M alba and one of the other Morus species.  I am not entirely certain.  This one is not as well suited to my climate as the other two, but it crops and grows each year so I haven't removed it.  

Mulberries - typical fruit from each tree

Comparing the two varieties of white mulberry M alba, is simple.  Both of these trees grow very fast, which is characteristic of white mulberries.  The leaves and growth pattern are much the same between the two types.  When not in fruit I would struggle to tell them apart.  This makes sense as they are both the same species.

The fruit of the darker one is usually a little larger than the lighter one, longer and fatter.  The darker ones taste more sour but in a good way, and they have greater depth of flavour.  Darker berries can stain things, this can be an issue when the fruit is stolen and deposited by birds. 

The lighter mulberry produce smaller berries, some are white and others have a purple blush to them.  They look vaguely similar to immali corn in their colouration.  These mulberries do not stain anything, which is nice as the birds do steal a lot of my berries.

Two mulberry varieties - the dark ones are larger

Two varieties of white mulberry (Morus alba)

I am yet to see a true black mulberry (Morus nigra) for sale in Australia.  I have seen plenty of trees labelled as nigra, yet so far none of them have been the real thing and all have been mislabeled alba.  The dark fruited one I have was listed as Morus nigra, yet it is clearly not M nigra.

M nigra is a slow growing tree and is difficult to propagate by cuttings, the buds are thick, often thicker than the branches they are borne on, and the stems of the berries are tiny and almost non-existent.  The taste of the fruit of a black mulberry is far superior to the best white mulberry.  

Dark fruited white mulberries

My dark fruited white mulberry is a really great tree.  It is very vigorous, and crops really well.  The berries are reasonably large, and are produced in large numbers.  They ripen over an extended period of time, which is common for white mulberries.  

The taste of the fruit is great if picked when fully ripe, few berries taste as good as a ripe mulberry.  If picked under-ripe the taste is good but not as great, and like all mulberries the fruit does not ripen further after being picked.  We discovered that the stem gets a little colour when they are fully ripe.  If the stem is only green, then they are not yet completely ripe.  This is good to know. 

These are not as sweet as the lighter coloured fruits, but they have a depth of flavour that is lacking in the other varietes.  I really like the taste of these darker mulberries.  I am told they make great pies, but at my house the berries are eaten so fast that few ever make it into the house.

The only issue I have with this tree is that it grows too fast, and gets top heavy.  As it rushes to reach the sky, the wood does not seem thick enough to hold the weight, and it can get broken in strong winds.  I wonder if giving it more sun, or less water, may help this.  I don't want this tree to get too tall, so I aggressively prune it after fruiting.  That seems to solve this problem. 

I am considering planting this tree in my chicken's run with some wire protecting the base.  If I do this the chickens can eat any fruit that is dropped, and there is a lot of fruit over the season!  The chickens can also eat mulberry leaves that are lower down.  Mulberry leaves have an impressive nutritional composition, and are readily eaten by my hens.  Studies show mulberry leaf can replace up to 10% of bought feed without reducing the number of eggs laid. 

Non-staining white mulberries

The lavender fruiting white mulberry is another great tree.  This one is not growing in good soil, where it is far too dry, yet it is a real survivor.  

This one is growing behind my fence out near a footpath and the road.  People walk past this, yet very few ever take any berries.  I doubt many people know what these berries are as they are light in colour, and the few who do recognise them may not realise it is ripe as it is light coloured.  This tree is far too large to net, and birds take many berries.  

This year there are more berries than ever before.  This tree is very productive.  I have no idea how many berries were stolen by birds, or how many my kids ate, but I picked many bowls full many times over this season.  

White mulberries - very sweet

These ripen white or lavender, some individual berries are much darker than others.  The taste of this is very sweet, far sweeter than the darker fruited mulberry.  My kids love the taste of these mulberries.  I really like them, but find I can't eat too many because they are too high in sugar for me.  

I eat these until I start to feel blood sugar issues building, then I try to eat less of them.  I find it hard to limit how many I eat because they are only here for a short time each year, and they are so nice, and surely one more can't hurt...  

I am not sure why some berries ripen lighter than others.  I don't think it has to do with sunlight.  Some of the mulberries are half light and half dark.  While this really doesn't matter, I still find it fascinating.

Mulberry, half dark half light

White Mulberry

The white shahtoot mulberries are not well suited to my climate.  This tree does ok here, but needs a lot of extra water, and parts of it die back each spring for unknown reasons.  The berries are very long, normally a little over 10cm long, this year they were far shorter than normal.  

Normally this tree produces a lot of berries, and this year was no exception.  Last year it got burned back badly by a late frost and didn't really fruit at all.  This year it produced more fruit than ever before.  I don't know if it has enough leaves for the amount of fruit it produced.  

While the taste of these berries is incredible, they do not taste much like regular mulberries.  When ripe they taste like honey ripened apricots, they are amazingly sweet.  I am told they dehydrate well, but have not tried this yet.  My kids love the taste of these shahtoot berries, as do I.  I find them a bit high in sugar and have to limit the amount I eat otherwise I get blood sugar problems.  Again I find it hard to limit these, because they taste so great.  

The white mulberry leaves are good vegetables, and can be used to make something that tastes surprisingly like green tea, I have not tried to eat shahtoot leaves.  They should do much the same job, but seem a little thicker so may need to be picked a little younger.  

I am tempted to get a red shahtoot, these are meant to have more mulberry flavour.  They are also meant to be less cold hardy, and I don't have much space to fit in another tree, so I may never grow one of them.  

White shahtoot mulberries

I don't think it is any surprise that I love mulberry trees.  I think they should be more widely grown.  If I had room for only one fruit tree, a mulberry would be high on the list of the few I would consider growing.  

Mulberry trees are like a vegetable garden on a trunk.  They produce ample nutritious leaves which can be cooked as vegetables or used to make tea or fed to animals, and they produce an abundance of berries which taste incredible yet are too soft to ever be found at markets.

Given how low maintenance mulberry trees are, and the amount of delicious berries they produce is nothing short of incredible, I am surprised I don't see more of them in people's gardens.  

Mulberries - I love them

I do have some extra mulberry trees I grew from cuttings.  At this stage I am not selling them (other than a few plants locally) as postage would be an issue.  Given these things can easily grow from pencil size to more than 6 feet tall in a season, perhaps I should sell small rooted cuttings over winter while they are dormant.  

If I ever do sell mulberry trees, they will be listed on my blog along with everything else I am selling that month, the details will be updated on my for sale page.  

Milk kefir from grains vs sachets comparison

Years ago I had milk kefir grains.  We made kefir most days, and we did this for years.  Other than the cost of the milk, it was very cheap.  

Making milk kefir from grains is very simple.  You put some kefir grains in milk, leave for a day or so, then strain the grains out and drink the liquid.  It doesn't get a lot simpler than that.  

I'm no expert when it comes to kefir, but I don't need to be.  For some reason, people try to make kefir making more expensive, and to appear more complicated, than it needs to be.  For centuries kefir was made by nomadic people, they put milk kefir grains in a goat skin or horse skin bag and added some milk.  Later they drank some of the liquid and added more milk.  Nothing was precise, and this went so well that it was kept up for generations.  

Milk kefir is demonstrated to have a lot of health benefits, so it is worth drinking if you like the taste.  I have heard a lot about kefir starter satchels, I have also seen bottled kefir for sale in supermarkets, so I did some research to compare them with kefir made from grains and thought I would share what I found. 

Milk kefir grains

I read about store bought kefir not being 'real' kefir, so I did a little research.  Supermarket kefir is a poor version that pales in comparison to the real thing, but is far more uniform than real kefir.  It is made by adding a small number of isolated cultures to milk.  This results in a drink that is very uniform and consistent.  

Real kefir made from grains contains a lot more probiotic cultures, both in terms of overall numbers as well as diversity of different cultures.  My kefir is never uniform, it is slightly different day to day, and it changes with the season.  

Store bought kefir is meant to be slightly healthier than store bought yogurt.  I found the image below on a website.  The claims they are making look good, but are rather unimpressive when compared to milk kefir made using grains.  I will explain this further down the page.

Store bought kefir vs yogurt image from https://lifewaykefir.com/kefir-vs-yogurt/

Kefir from the supermarket is expensive, and is an ongoing cost.  You buy it, drink it, and buy some more.  Kefir from grains still has an ongoing cost, but it is much lower.  You buy grains, then the ongoing cost is buying milk to make more kefir.  

Based on the anecdotal evidence above, if you want something that is the same every time then store bought is best.  If you are consuming kefir for health benefits, or if cost is an issue, then making it from milk kefir grains is the far better option.  

Milk kefir

I have also seen satchels of 'kefir starter' for sale.  These are very expensive, and I have heard they are inferior to kefir made from grains.  I was curious about them so I did a little research to compare them to grains. 

Starter sachets, contain very few species of beneficial bacteria and yeasts.  I found one product that claims to only have 5 strains and even the 'good' brands claim to only contain 7.  While this is better than most yogurts which usually have only 1 or 2 strains (some can have up to half a dozen), part of the reason people drink kefir is because it contains a lot of different probiotic cultures.  

Home made kefir using grains contains far more biota in terms of diversity of the species of microorganisms present.  While this number varies considerably, kefir has been recorded as having 41 species of bacteria and 37 yeasts (a total of 78 different species of microorganisms).  This is more than ten times the amount of species found in good starter sachets and more than six times as many as bottled kefir from the supermarket.  

Based on the above, if you want a lot of diversity in your probiotics, kefir grains is the better option.  

Milk kefir

Diversity is important, another thing to consider is the number of colony forming units.  This number is how many live microorganisms (of any kind) are in the end product.  This number is important because many will die on their way through your digestive tract.  The number of colony forming units in sachet made kefir or store bought kefir is often claimed to be a mere 1 billion to 2.5 billion colony forming units per cup.  This small number has been demonstrated to be far lower in real life than is claimed on packages.  For simplicity, let's assume that this exaggerated number is correct.  

Depending on which paper you read (including this paper and another paper), kefir made from grains is said to contain between 100 billion colony forming units per cup up to several trillion colony forming units per cup.  Even the lowest estimate is vastly more than the amount as sachet made or store bought kefir.  

Based on the above it seems if you want a lot of probiotics in your diet, using kefir grains is the better option.  

Kefir grains

Diversity of probiotics is important, as is the number of live colony forming units, another important consideration is cost.  

The supermarket sells a pack of 5 x sachets (which, after you also buy milk, is said to make up to 25L) for $53 plus the cost of milk.  Another brand which has 2 x sachets and claims to only contain 6 strains sells for a whopping $28 plus the cost of milk.  If you like the taste of satchel kefir, you need to keep buying satchels at this high price forever.  I have heard of people using sachet produced 'kefir' to inoculate milk in the hope of keeping this going long term, apparently it stops working after a few tries.

Milk kefir grains, on the other hand, can be used indefinitely to make as many batches of kefir as you want for the rest of your life.  The grains multiply over time, so you can make more kefir, or give some grains away, or eat some grains, or feed them to chickens, or bury them in the garden.  After the once off cost of grains, you buy milk, maybe a kitchen strainer every ten years, and there is no other cost.  

Financially, kefir grains are far cheaper than starter satchels or supermarket kefir both in the short term and far far cheaper in the medium and long term.  

I don't know how to photograph kefir

Taste is a personal thing.  My kefir can be rather yeasty at times, which I love, or hardly yeast at all at other times.  Satchel and store bought tend not to include yeasts so will not have much of that yeasty taste.  

My kefir tends to get a bit sour at times, perhaps more than I like.  A little honey fixes that.  I assume store bought or satchel would be far less sour as consumers prefer sweeter products.  

If you are drinking kefir because of its taste, I can't tell you which is better.  You need to try a bunch of types and make some from grains and go with the one you prefer.  

Milk Kefir and Water Kefir

If you like to drink milk kefir, it is absolutely worth making your own and seeing if you like that. Milk kefir made from grains is far healthier and far cheaper than store bought or made from satchels.  If you dislike the taste of kefir made with grains, or if you dislike that it is slightly different each batch, then stop making it and go back to buying it from the store.

I make milk kefir, and often have extra grains that I can post throughout Australia.  If you are interested, my contact details can be found on my for sale page. 

Perennial buckwheat vs fish mint

A few years ago, I started growing a perennial vegetable called Vietnamese fish mint (Houttuynia cordata).  This perennial plant is used as a vegetable, or herb, or medicine, or grown as an ornamental, in a host of different countries. 

Fish mint is an extremely productive and vigorous plant, and borders on being indestructible, which is a great trait for a perennial vegetable to have.  Fish mint is productive, it looks pretty, and is incredibly healthy to eat, but I find the smell to be a little overpowering.  

I grew fish mint for years, and wished that there was a version of it that was not so strong smelling.  Some people love the smell of fish mint, however, I find it a bit too much. 

Fish mint on left, buckwheat on right 

Fish mint produces copious amounts of food and tolerates poor growing conditions.  I only grow it in a pot with pavers under it, otherwise I worry it may escape through the drainage holes and get into the garden.  After years of growing it like this I have never had it even come close to escaping into my yard.  

I am told that people grow this as an ornamental in the garden and regret it.  They say that spraying with weed killer removes growth above the soil line, but the plant survives and springs up again from rhizomes.  After it escapes, every time you mow your yard, or walk through your yard, it smells like fish.  

My fish mint produces flowers, and I am told it does not set viable seed.  For the first year or so I removed all of its flowers in case they set seed.  After the first year I just let it flower and hoped for the best.  

Fish mint escaping it's pot

Fish mint growing out of the drainage holes 

Not long after allowing fish mint to flower, I grew common buckwheat (Fagopyrum esculentum) from seed.  The cotyledons were rather unique, I had not seen cotyledons like them before, but it was the true leaves that concerned me.  

The true leaves of buckwheat were much the same shape as fish mint.  I worried that my fishmint may have set seed, and I was concerned that it had escaped.  Would my yard smell like fish for ever more?  Oh, the terror.  I honestly felt sick to my stomach with worry that this had gotten away from me.  

I didn't remove the seedlings at this stage, I left them to see if I was wrong and hoped I could get on top of things.  I was hopeful that I had not lost control of the fish mint because the seedlings were only in the one spot I planted buckwheat, and were nowhere near the fish mint.  Once the seedlings grew a little larger, I bruised, smelled, and tasted a leaf.  I was pretty convinced that they were not fish mint seedlings, but I still worried that maybe they didn't get their distinctive smell until older.  

The seedlings grew and rather quickly flowered.  The flowers were buckwheat and looked nothing like fish mint flowers, then it set seed that was clearly buckwheat, confirming that they were absolutely not fish mint.  Phew!  

I have been growing fish mint for years, and have never had it set viable seed.  

After growing fish mint for a few years, and reading about all of its benefits, I started to wish that there was a variety that did not smell so strong.  I considered trying to restore fertility and grow seeds and try to breed something that didn't smell as strong, but I am glad to say that I thought better of it.  I didn't want this spreading by seed through my lawn.  Not setting seed is a good trait for this vigorous plant to have, I don't want this plant to set seed. 

Perennial buckwheat - Fagopyrum cymosum

A few years later I learned of a perennial vegetable called perennial buckwheat (Fagopyrum cymosum complex, also called Fagopyrum dibotrys), this also goes by the common names "Golden Buckwheat" and "Tall Buckwheat".  This perennial vegetable sounds a lot like fish mint, but it has no smell.

Even though these plants are not even distantly related, my wish for fish mint that is not strong smelling has basically come true.  Perennial buckwheat does all the things I wanted fish mint to do (and more), and has none of the down sides.  

While perennial buckwheat and fish mint are not closely related the plants look superficially very similar to one another.  They are both perennial plants that are very vigorous and highly productive.  They both cope with hard frosts, and survive poor soils (they survive poor soil, they are vastly more productive in good soil).  They both spread vigorously by underground rhizomes.  They both have nice looking heart shaped leaves.  They have both been eaten as leaf vegetables and their rhizomes used as folk medicine by people for centuries.  They both have a lot of proven medicinal properties (for people as well as poultry and livestock) that have been reported through many peer reviewed papers.  

Perennial buckwheat plants

In my garden, perennial buckwheat grows much taller than fish mint.  In autumn, perennial buckwheat leaves become a brilliant golden yellow colour, whereas fish mint just grows until getting burnt down by frosts.  The flowers of fish mint are visited by pollinator insects only there is little else flowering, while perennial buckwheat flowers seem to be adored by beneficial pollinators and appear to be one of the preferred sources of nectar and pollen.  Perennial buckwheat leaves are high in rutin, and high in protein.  

I have not read anything about how much fish mint is safe to consume.  I think the smell would stop me eating it long before I ran into trouble.  Perennial buckwheat leaves (much like most common vegetables) have some levels of anti-nutrients, even so peer reviewed papers prove that it is safe to eat perennial buckwheat every day. 

Vietnamese fish mint

If you are into Asian cuisine, you should probably grow fish mint.  It can be used like a vegan fish sauce.  I have plenty of these plants, they are very vigorous.  

If you are into growing food, or concerned about food security, growing perennial buckwheat is a must.  I am not sure why it is so uncommon in Australia, it seems to only be common in developing nations where growing food really counts.  At this stage I am still trialing it under different conditions, and seeing what it can do.  

At some point if I have any spare plants I will list perennial buckwheat plants for sale, along with fish mint, on my perennial vegetables for sale page.