Culinary Rhubarb Production in North America: History and Recent Statistics
1991; American Society for Horticultural Science; Volume: 26; Issue: 11 Linguagem: Inglês
10.21273/hortsci.26.11.1360
ISSN2327-9834
Autores Tópico(s)Botanical Studies and Applications
ResumoRhubarb's history as a highly popular laxative drug and a general tonic traces back to ancient China and the Mediterranean region, although not until the 18th Century do we come upon occasional reports of its petioles being used for food, mainly in England and English colonies.[Earlier, in England and reportedly in the Middle East, rhubarb was used as a table green like spinach or beet greens, it not being understood that the leaves can be toxic and even fatal, probably because of calcium oxalates and/or anthrone glycosides (The Lancet, 1917;Tallqvist and Vaananen, 1960).]Nonetheless, widespread table use did not occur in either North America or northern Europe until the 19th Century.Botanists and horticulturists did not agree on the taxonomy of this crop (Akeroyd, 1989;Marshall, 1988).The finest medicinal roots and rhizomes had been carried to Europe from the hinterlands of China fairly continuously from ancient times.In the 17th and 18th Centuries, seeds of several species were brought to Europe from Asia.However, they did not breed true when propagated by seed, and many hybridized readily when planted within pollination distance, producing what was then known as bastard or mule varieties.The consequence of this hybridization was that there were soon many cultivars, leaving us uncertain as to the species origin of the culinary type.Even today, it is common to label culinary rhubarbs as Rheum rhabarbar-urn (which is the same as R. undulatum), as Bailey does (Liberty Hyde Bailey Hortorium, 1976), or as R. rhaponticum; but the important fact is that all of the ˜ 60 cultivars of culinary rhubarb now grown are hybrids of one sort or another.It is probably more useful to employ the botanical name R.x cultorum (Akeroyd, 1989). REASONS FOR INCREASED POPULARITYCulinary rhubarb cultivation first enjoyed great popularity in Great Britain in the first half of the 19th Century.The aggressive
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