Blooming Again After A Year

This plant in my wife's garden, a vine actually, takes its sweet time to bloom. But when it does, the flowers are so beautiful that one would definitely not mind the wait. I just saw this yesterday and really gave me a start. It seemed to appear out of nowhere, just like that.

The last time I saw this bloom was a year ago. And before that, it took nearly 10 months to flower. This is the Garlic Vine.

Mansoa alliacea, or garlic vine, is a species of tropical liana in the family Bignoniaceae. It is native to Northern South America, and has spread to Central America and Brazil. Among the mestizos of the Amazon rainforest it is known as ajo sacha, a Spanish-Quechua name that means "forest garlic" or "wild garlic". Wikipedia

It is a relative of the trumpet flower but has the distinct odor of garlic. I could not believe this at first until the person who gave us this plant took a leaf, crushed it and asked me to smell it. It really smelled like garlic!

Garlic Vine, based on my readings about it in the internet, not only has medicinal uses but seasoning uses as well similar to that of basil or rosemary. The young leaves can be chopped up and sprinkled over salad or pasta. The more matured leaves and other plant parts like the bark and flower can be used as ingredient for herbal formulas in capsule form to treat various ailments such as arthritis, rheumatism, colds, flu and fever. The plant contains several sulphur compounds like alliin and allyl sulphides similar to those in garlic, that give it analgesic, anti-inflammatory, anti-rheumatic and anti-pyretic properties and used for the treatment of the various ailments mentioned earlier.

Aesthetics and utility. It's like beauty and brains. A real wonder how nature works in providing our needs, not just on the physical but on the emotional and spiritual levels. Let me end this post with this quote about nature.

“In all things of nature there is something of the marvelous.” — Aristotle

(All photos are mine.)