Goodness,  Readers, when I was taking my little  walk along the County Roads yesterday I was very taken with how far the Amaranth, that I first wrote about in 2024, has spread. It seems to grow in virtually no soil at all, and pops forth a great crop of surprisingly toothsome leaves, considering that we’ve had next to no rain for months.

It’s difficult to identify Amaranth to species level – my current plant app suggests that this is Redroot Amaranth (Amaranthus retroflexus) but with only 34 percent certainty, so we won’t stick our neck out. Nor can we be sure how the plant arrived in the County Roads (specifically Huntingdon for any curious botanists out there). One theory is that it arrived with sand, maybe used when the EV chargers were put in. Another is that it came with bird seed. Yet another relates to those tasty green leaves, which are known as callaloo in Caribbean cooking, and could well have come from someone’s vegetable garden or allotment. What is certain is that it is happy here, bless it, and is colonising all sorts of unpromising spots.

Each one of those flowerheads (or ‘panicles’) contains 1000 to 3000 seeds, which can be harvested – the seeds have no outer husk and are rich in protein and several dietary minerals. The grains can also be milled into flower, and used for bread or cakes. Furthermore, the plant is extremely drought-tolerant, and can be grown around the panels in solar farms, providing an easily-harvested and easily-maintained crop. It’s already eaten by many communities around the world – in addition to the callaloo already mentioned, it’s eaten with rice and beans in Brazil, as a salad ingredient in Greece, and the leaves are eaten in India, Vietnam and China. The plant, both seeds and leaves, is also widely consumed in various African countries. It’s something of a star, and here it is, growing in a gutter. Clearly, respect is due to this tough, prolific plant. Maybe it’s no coincidence that the name ‘Amaranth’ comes from the Greek word for ‘unfading’.