Karl has been having excellent success with his moringa trees.

Last week he sent me some great pictures.

First, look at these huge pods:

And what do you do when your moringa tree makes lots of pods? Why, save the seeds and plant more moringa of course:

And man, they are really making pods:

Even if you aren’t trying to plant them on purpose, moringas have a way of growing themselves:

I had the same thing happen with some moringa I cut back here in the tropics. The tree had some pods on it but was shading the garden. I chopped it back severely, but in doing so, some of the pods shattered.

A few weeks later, I started finding seedlings scattered around my garden beds.

Why Grow Moringa Trees?

Moringa is a good food, a good medicine and even a good fertilizer.

I wouldn’t be without this tree. we put the leaves in soups, in scrambled eggs and even in spaghetti sauce. They’re loaded with nutrition. Though in India, the young green pods are eaten regularly, most of my trees have failed to bear enough to make that worthwhile. So, leaves it is.

Moringa trees are easy to propagate from seeds or cuttings. They have very week wood and can be chopped and dropped to feed the soil in food forests. I also use the leaves in my liquid teas, treating moringa much the way permaculture enthusiasts up north treat comfrey – as a cut and come again perennial that feeds the soil as it decays. Comfrew never did well for me in Florida but moringa did great. I’m not sure how comfrey would perform here in the tropics, but I’m sure moringa would have it beaten here as well.

You can read more on germinating moringa seeds here.

And check out my survival plant profile here.

And, of course, I cover moringa trees in my book Totally Crazy Easy Florida Gardening.