In ancient times, water chestnuts were mostly eaten as fruit, while famine years were used to satisfy hunger. In the Ming Dynasty, Wang Pan and Wang Hong gradually wrote about it. Water chestnut juice is sweet and nutritious. In addition to raw food, hot food can also be made into all kinds of dishes suitable for both meat and vegetables. Water chestnut is also a traditional Chinese medicine, and its seedlings, roots and fruits can be used as medicine.
Water chestnut has strong adaptability, likes warm and humid, and is not resistant to frost. Water chestnut usually grows in shallow water. Water chestnut needs high temperature and long sunshine in the early growth stage, such as the optimum temperature for germination is 15-20℃ and the optimum temperature for tillering is 25-30℃.
In the late growth stage, shortening the illumination time (less than 13 hours) can promote bulb formation, and lower temperature (20-25℃) is also beneficial to bulb expansion. The soil is sandy loam or humus, with shallow soil layer and pH value of 6-7.
Morphological characteristics of water chestnut
The creeping rhizome of water chestnut is slender. Most of the culms are tufted, straight, slender, cylindrical, 40- 100 cm high, 2-3 mm in diameter, gray-green, smooth, hairless and septate. After drying, the surface of the stalk has knots and many longitudinal stripes.
No leaves, only 2-3 leaf sheaths at the base of the stem; Sheath is light brown, smooth, hairless, membranous, clasping stems, with oblique sheath mouth and sharp tip, 7- 15 cm long.
Spikelets are cylindrical, 2-4 cm long, about 3 mm in diameter and light green. A scale at the base is hollow and flowerless, supporting the spikelet base for a week, sometimes with a short sheath. The remaining scales are flower-shaped, loosely arranged in a tile shape, with a wide oblong top, a length of 5-6 mm and a width of about 4 mm, a wide dry film at the edge, a narrow dry film at the top edge and no obvious midvein. Lower setae 7-8, one and a half times longer than nutlets; Have barbs; Stigma 2.
Nutlets are obovate, oblate, biconvex, 2 mm long and 65438±0.2mm wide, smooth, yellow at the top and hexagonal in surface cells. Style base is flat, long and narrow triangle, not spongy, and there are inconspicuous rings at the base. The texture of the ring is the same as that of the nutlet, but the color is lighter. The flowering and fruiting period is May-65438+1October.