Devil's Tongue (Amorphophallus konjac) - The bizarre Asian beauty

Fascinated by the Titan Arum but intimidated by its care? Then the Devil's Tongue is just for you! It is the uncomplicated, absolutely robust little sister from the arum family. It offers a spectacular bloom, a leaf that looks like a small tree, and quite incidentally provides the raw material for the ultimate superfood.

Included in delivery: Vigorous plants in 7cm and 9cm pots

Growth & Appearance

• Lifespan: Perennial, tuber-forming plant.

• Height: The single, umbrella-like leaf that the plant develops in summer often grows over 1 meter (sometimes up to 1.5 meters) high and looks like a small palm tree.

• Habit: The leaf stalk is an absolute eye-catcher! It is smooth and strikingly mottled, making it look surprisingly like the skin of a snake (hence the common name "Snake Palm").

• Bloom: When the tuber is large enough (from approx. 500 g tuber weight), it produces a huge, deep wine-red to black-violet bloom in the late winter, shaped like a gigantic calla lily, with a long spadix (the "Devil's Tongue") protruding from the center.

Origin Its original home is in the warm, humid regions of Southeast Asia (especially in China, Japan, and Vietnam), where it grows in shady to semi-shady forests.

Ingredients (The weight-loss miracle & an IMPORTANT WARNING)

• The Magic Fiber: The tuber is rich in Glucomannan. This extremely swelling dietary fiber can bind 50 times(!) its own weight in water.

• Caution, poisonous when raw! Like all arum plants, all parts of the plant contain sharp calcium oxalate crystals. The tuber must never be eaten raw, but must be processed extensively.

Usage

• In the kitchen (Fitness food): In Asia, jelly, flour, and noodles have been made from the tuber's flour for centuries. Today, it is primarily known to us as calorie-free "Shirataki noodles" – the holy grail of any low-carb diet, as they are very filling but contain almost zero calories.

• In cosmetics: The famous, extremely soft "Konjac sponges" for gentle facial cleansing are made from the plant fibers.

• In the garden/home: A fascinating ornamental plant that does wonderfully on the balcony or in the garden bed during the summer.

Historical In Japan, the Konjac root has been cultivated as a valuable medicinal and food plant since the 6th century. It was originally used as medicine for coughs and for intestinal cleansing ("broom for the stomach").

Curiosities (The miracle on the windowsill, the "scent" & the fly trap) The Devil's Tongue has some absolute quirks in store:

1. The dry bloomer: Once the tuber has reached its blooming weight, it wakes you up in late winter out of nowhere with a bloom. The crazy thing: It needs neither soil nor water for this! You can simply lay the bare tuber down, and it will push out its gigantic bloom solely from the energy stored in the tuber.

2. The carrion smell (Follow the gardener's tip!): Similar to the Titan Arum, the bloom emits an extreme scent of rotting meat for a few days. Therefore, the absolute pro tip: Wait until at least February before putting the dormant tuber in a warmer spot! This artificially delays the bloom a bit, allowing you to move the flowering plant and its beastly stench directly outside. Do not put it in the hallway under any circumstances! Otherwise, the whole house will stink – unless, of course, you want to "delight" unloved neighbors with it...

3. Pollination (A clever trap): The nasty stench has a purpose: it attracts blowflies and carrion beetles. These crawl deep down into the kettle of the bloom and are kept "trapped" there overnight by extremely slippery walls in order to pollinate the female flowers at the very bottom. Only the next day do the male flowers open, dusting the trapped insects generously with fresh pollen, and the kettle wall becomes grippy again so the flies can escape. Important for seed collectors: Since the female and male flowers on the same plant mature at different times to avoid inbreeding, you generally need the pollen of a second, simultaneously blooming Devil's Tongue for successful pollination (and the harvest of the red berries)!

Location, Care & Hibernation (Absolutely beginner-friendly!)

• Location (Summer): Partial shade. Ideally outdoors in a garden bed or a large pot from mid-May.

• Soil: Humus-rich, nutrient-rich, and loose. It grows rapidly in summer and has a correspondingly large appetite and thirst.

• The dormant phase (Winter): When the snake-like leaf turns yellow and falls over in autumn, the plant retreats. Now, simply remove the tuber from the soil, carefully brush it off with a soft brush, and store it completely dry, dark, frost-free, and above all not too warm! (If you store it too warm, the bloom will sprout way too early). Wintering couldn't be easier!

• The cycle: In spring, tiny pink "horns" appear on the tuber – this is the new growth! As soon as these horns grow, you simply plant them back into fresh soil, and the spectacle begins all over again.