What are the main reasons for the low yield of Gastrodia elata?
Gastrodia elata is a precious Chinese medicinal herb unique to China, with powerful medicinal effects. It can not only be used as medicine, but is also an important ingredient commonly used in daily life to make medicinal dishes. The scarcity of wild resources has led to the rise of artificial cultivation, but many herb farmers experience extremely low yields when planting it, resulting in low returns. So what are the reasons for the low yield of Gastrodia elata? Let's take a look.
1. Poor quality of Armillaria mellea
Armillaria mellea is the main nutrient source for Gastrodia elata, so the quality of Armillaria mellea is closely related to the yield of Gastrodia elata. During production, it generally needs to go through multiple operations such as virus elimination and isolation before the strain can be used to cultivate fungal material for planting, so as to maintain quality. However, some herb farmers, in order to save costs and increase profits, choose some ordinary strains when selecting Armillaria mellea, or use some old fungal material as the strain, which leads to strain degeneration and reduced vitality, so the yield is also not high.
2. Degeneration of seed tubers
When cultivating Gastrodia elata, hybrid varieties are generally used. This is the same as crops such as corn and soybeans; hybrid varieties have strong vitality and higher yields. However, traditional Gastrodia elata is mostly passed down from generation to generation. In order to save costs, the principle of self-propagation and self-use has always been adopted, resulting in the degeneration of seed tubers, with vitality becoming lower and lower, so the yield also gets worse year after year.
3. Poor soil permeability
No living thing can grow without breathing; this is true for animals and also for plants. When planting Gastrodia elata, coarse sand is generally used, or loose, humus-rich soil is chosen. If the planting soil is too heavy and sticky, or is fine sand, the soil permeability will be poor, preventing normal respiration and thereby affecting the yield.
4. Waterlogging
Although Armillaria mellea can survive in water, as a plant, Gastrodia elata does not have this ability to survive underwater. If the soil has too much accumulated water or the groundwater level is relatively high, just a short 2-3 days will cause large-scale death and rot of Gastrodia elata.
5. Pests and diseases
Pests and diseases have always been a major reason affecting the development of medicinal herbs. When Gastrodia elata is cultivated in moist conditions, there are relatively few pests and diseases, but if the fungal material and linden wood are not thoroughly disinfected and sterilized, they may carry other fungi. These will affect the growth of Armillaria mellea and compete with it for nutrients and territory, so that it cannot grow normally, and Gastrodia elata also cannot absorb nutrients normally, resulting in low yield. In addition, insect pests are mainly underground pests, which gnaw on the mycelium and their rhizomes, leading to reduced yield.
The above is an introduction to the reasons for the low yield of Gastrodia elata. I hope it can help you. To learn more related knowledge, please follow us.