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Making Your Own Herb Garden: Getting To Know The Coca Plants

By Flower | February 6, 2010

The coca plant is one of the most prejudiced plants currently being produced and used. Most commonly associated with being the species which cocaine is derived from, it has the stereotype of being a dangerous plant. However, the coca plant has many medicinal and safe uses, which have been utilized by herbalists since the species’ discovery. That’s why it’s also beneficial for you to have these plants in making your herb garden.

The coca plant lives in South America, Africa, Ceylon, Taiwan, Indonesia and Formosa. However, it is most commonly stereotyped for its existence in the Andes of South America, where the majority of cocaine is created. The first discovered documentation of the plants was in 1783, but it was not officially registered until 1786, where it was given the name Erythroxylum coca. But, it is believed that the coca plant has been tended as a domestic species for over two thousand years. There is proof within burial grounds of coca to lend credence this theory.

Diligence and effort is much needed to grow the coca plant. The life of the coca plant begins as a fruit, which is picked when the drupes are almost ripe. These drupes are set within a container and left to sit where the skin of the fruit becomes squishy. Once this has taken place, the seeds are removed and the seeds are put in the sunlight to dry out.

Only once this happens, the seeds can be sown. It takes 24 days for the coca plant to germinate. Once the plant has grown 4 leaves, they are protected by a lattice covering for a year.

After the year has completed, the plants are transferred to preparation fields. This transportation can only be done within the rainy season. Three years after this transfer, some leaves may be harvested. Once the coca plant is able to be harvested, they are gathered three or four times a year. A fully established acre of coca plants can yield 1,500 to 2,000 pounds of leaf on a yearly basis.

While coca plants are annual, a field will be replanted once every twenty years, as the quality of the plant fades over time.

Coca-Cola is the most known producer and user of the coca plant. While this beverage no longer contains any drugs, it is still made directly from the coca leaf.

In starting your herb garden, as coca plants are so pricey, there are many steps taken to guard the crops from natural predators and disease. There are a few varieties of bugs that prey on the coca plants, as well as fungus that can harm or destroy the stalks, branches and leaves. Weeds can also be fatal to young coca plants, as the weeds remove the soil of the nutrients that the plants need for basic life. In making your own herb garden, it’s good to know that there are also some medicinal benefits with the coca plant. Modern medicinal uses of coca include use as a bactericide, as spinal anesthetics and as treatments for diseases such as shingles and eczema.

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