THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: It’s one yam about which old-timers say if you plant it in your vegetable patch, you can pluck it from your neighbour’s yard.Now, a city-based farmer has come up with a mammoth version of the tuber which in Malayalam is popularly known as ‘Mulkkizhangu.’ Purple yam (Dioscorea alata) in English, the tuber normally comes in a bunch weighing, on an average, five to six kilograms. But R Raveendran, a national award-winning farmer from Ulloor - has managed to cultivate a single bunch that weighs a whopping 82 kg!
“One reason for the old saying is the ball-like tuber grows at the end of a root which is almost one metre long. ‘Mulkkizhangu,’ now rarely cultivated in the state, is special in that it can survive drought. It’s called so in Malayalam because its vines have thorns on them. But the yam is very tasty and ideal for curries,” he said. “A scientist with the Central Tuber Crops Research Institute (CTCRI) told me that usually, the full bunch weighs five to six kg. The maximum weight recorded is about 20 kg.’’
In his latest harvest, the biggest single tuber weighs 5 kg and smallest, about half a kg. For Raveendran giant yams are nothing new. Raveendran initially grabbed headlines for cultivating giant-sized African yams. In his latest harvest, the biggest single tuber weighs 5 kg and smallest, about half a kg. For Raveendran giant yams are nothing new. Raveendran initially grabbed headlines for cultivating giant-sized African yams.
In 2011, his name was listed in the Limca Book of Records when he managed to grow a 275 kg African yam. Raveendran, recipient of the ‘Innovative Farmer’ award instituted by the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), got hold of a purple yam seed in 2014 at a farm expo in 2014. Last year, he harvested a bunch that weighed 32 kg.
So how come he manages to break agricultural records consistently? He says he does not use chemical fertilisers. Perhaps he owes it to the special combination of organic compost and fertiliser that he applies in his farmstead. The main ingredient of the compost is human hair which he collects from barber shops. He calls the organic fertiliser he has developed ‘Hridayamritham.’ It contains about 100 varieties of herbs, cow urine, fish amino acid, flour and cow dung.