Comfrey Lunch
If there was a crop that once established produced fifty tons per acre per
year and thus far out-performed maize, lucerne, rape, kale and even soya bean
as a source of digestible protein for livestock, wouldn't it be grown extensively?
Surprisingly little grown, comfrey is such a crop.
For instance comfrey can replace up to 30 per cent of the feed of pigs. Horses
thrive on a diet of comfrey and reduced oats or wheat cavings. This saves
lots of money as hay is only needed in winter, prevents scour in foals and
calcium and phosophorous shortage in mares in foal. Comfrey is a low fibre,
high protein, high mineral feed ideal for poultry who need a low fibre diet.
In symbiotic manner the straw, wood shavings, chicken droppings, etc, in used
chicken deep-litter provide the readily available nitrogen, phosphorus, and
potash that comfrey needs while poultry love to be fed comfrey. The vitamin
content of their eggs, particularly vitamins A and B12, is much higher than
that of battery farm eggs.
Comfrey, species name Symphytum Peregrinum, has upwards of thirty different
varieties including the wild comfrey, S. Officinale, long known to herbalists.
But the highest yielding comfrey was Russian Comfrey; a rare F, hybrid cross
of caucasion S. Asperrimum and S. Officinale imported from Russia in 1871
as a source of gum for stamps! Genetics still being unaccepted the danger
of a hybrid's performance degenerating with successive generations, unless
propagated vegetatively, was not realised. Now only inferior descendants
from the hybrid remain. Named after Bocking where the author founded the Comfrey
Research Association in 1954, these distinct varieties now have 'cultivar'
names; Bocking No. 1, Bocking No. 2, etc. This is very important as each Boking
has a different yield, amino-acid, mineral, vitamin, carbohydrate, and fibre
content. Common hedgerow S. Officinale has a very low yield.
Comfrey gathers up minerals from up to eight feet into the ground and is a
good natural fertiliser. Unfortunately the section of the book on the medical
uses of comfrey is dated. However, it does emphasise that comfrey is unusual
among plants in that it contains vitamin B12, and is richer in vital amino-acids,
including lysine and tryptophan, than many imported nuts. Vegans take note.
So far all could be roses, but comfrey is not the panacea that it at first
seems. For if a means of making it more palatable could be developed malnutrition
in poor parts of the world could soon be alleviated. Unfortunately this has
not appealed to companies interested in. making large profits and so has been
neglected.
The many problems of comfrey mainly stem from lack of common sense knowledge
of the ways of cultivating it. The problems include the need to carefully
select the highest yielding plants for root cuttings, the expense of establishing
it and the unresolved problem of making hay from it.
If it is to be grown on an ecologically sound basis it should be paired with
a nitrogen-fixing legume in a manner not yet devised. Here a big problem is
convention. Large sums of money are spent breeding hybrids of accepted
crops, inventing pesticides etc. Introducing a new, organic farming method
to farmers needs the backing of agricultural ministries and agencies.
Comfrey could be a very cost competitive 'organic' farming crop. But until
feasible farming methods are developed economics may still force farmers to
use agri-business methods to provide protein en masse.
