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Cows Udder Titty Fruit Solanum Mammosum Seeds
Packet of 15+ home grown organic seeds!
I get asked for this guy all the time, for several years actually, and I am very happy to finally have some seeds available.
Considered a lucky plant that will either bring prosperity or fertility or both, it really is unique and very rarely available here in Australia.
A relative of the eggplant, unfortunately this fella is a poisonous ornamental, not a food.
Think frangipani, not tomato.
Don’t let that stop you growing it though!
It looks super cool and is a real conversation starter.
The bright yellow fruit are not in any way photoshopped, that is really how they look.
Just like a cows udder, or a half inflated rubber glove, or mickey mouse, or a foxes face or if you really really squint a Chinese pagoda…
That leads me to the first common name, Wu dai tong tang or “Five generations living harmoniously under one roof”.
It is also know as apple of sodom, berinjela, breast berry, breastberry, cabeca de cabrito, canary eggplant, cows udder, cow’s udder, fox eggplant, fox face, horned eggplant, jua bravo, jurubeba do para, kanariyanasu, kitsunenasu, love apple, macawbush, macaw bush, mackaw bush, mickey mouse plant, nipple fruit, nipplefruit nightshade, nipple nightshade, nyun wenkibobi, peito de moca, pichichio, pig face, pigs ears, soresumba, terong susu, tit fruit, tit plant, titty fruit, tsunonasu, turkey berry, zombie apple, zombie fruit and it was also once know as Solanum globiferum, Solanum globiferum, Solanum mammosissimum, Solanum mammosissium, Solanum mammosum var. corniculum, Solanum platanifolium, Solanum platanifolium, and Solanum villosissimum.
Easy to grow but being a Solanum species it can take a anywhere from a week to a couple months to start popping up and the seedlings themselves have a fair bit of variation in them.
Some are spiky like Naranjilla, some have have sparse rose like thorns, and some have no spikes at all.
As they grow some lose or gain spines or thorns but by the time they are large and flowering they are no harder to deal with than your average rose bush with about half completely thornless.
Ga3 or Smoke treatment does speed germination if you don’t want to wait, but you will have to run those tests yourself as I accidentally deleted that data…
The fruit sliced and rubbed along surfaces like doorways and window frames will repel cockroaches because of the naturally occurring and toxic steroidal glycoalkaloids(but it may or may not also peel or stain your paint job at the same time…).
They are used as religious offerings and good luck charms in many parts of Asia, especially in New years celebrations, and in Japan they are very popular in Ikebana or cut flower type displays.
Being very high in sapanoids in some places the ripe fruit are used in place of soap and detergents for washing clothes, similar to the way soap nuts are used.
Keeping in mind that it is very very poisonous and this is not something I would ever recommend, but I did find a couple folks saying it can be cooked and eaten like a vegetable when it is unripe, providing calcium, phosphorus, iron and vitamin B, and another way suggested was by boiling the whole fruit and drinking the juices once cooled.
Traditionally the roots, boiled with sour milk and grain are used as a treatment syphilis, the leaves are used as a poultice for piles, or as a tea for digestion issues, or just applied to fungal skin conditions like ring worm, or even consumed as a narcotic.
I will pass on all of that and I very strongly suggest you do too.
It’s a great ornamental species, way better than a boring old rose bush in my humble opinion.
One other thing I noticed is that it seems to reliably kill rats that mistake the fruit for my eggplant and tomatoes.
Couple little chew marks on the fruit and I find the buggers dead on the lawn a couple days later.
Very handy!
Grown by me and the Mrs organically, no chems no nasties no problems!!!
