Culinary Turmeric (Curcuma longa) in 90 mm Bottomless Pot

Family: Zingiberaceae (includes gingers, galangals, and turnerics)
Genus: Curcuma (includes turmerics and Siam Tulip)

Botanical/Binomial Name: Curcuma longa
Meaning of Name:
Curcuma, from New Latin, from Arabic كُرْكُم (kurkum, ‘turmeric’, ‘Indian saffron’ (a reference to the colour); and
longa, from Latin rotunda (feminine singular of longus, ‘long, extended’): a reference to the shape of the rhizomes

Common Names: Turmeric, Common Turmeric, Poor Man’s Saffron

Botanical Characteristics: Herbaceous | Perennial | Rhizomatous | Frost tender
Propagation: Division of rhizomes

Item Description:
These turmeric plants are roughly 500 mm tall and the dimensions of the bottomless pot are 90 mm square × 150 mm deep — I love these pots as the square shape and bottomless design produces beautifully straight and deep roots with no spiralling whatsoever. (I sell these brand-new if interested.)

I reuse and recycle pots whenever possible, and the pots the plants come in may show signs of this, but are otherwise in great condition.

The pots sit in very shallow water (when not being photographed!), which is why roots are seen coming through the bottoms in the first photo.

The plant you will receive may not be the one in the photo, but will be very similar. I may remove the pot and/or trim the leaves when posting if that aids packing and getting postage down for you.

Plant Description:
This member of the ginger family is both a culinary and medicinal plant, as well as a striking ornamental with beautiful leaves and flower.

The turmeric plant grows to a bit over a metre tall and half a metre wide, with a beautiful flower inflorescence about 200 mm high.

Growth underground is via a spreading horizontal rhizome, which is the source of the turmeric spice.

Growing Information:
Turmeric is a very productive plant traditionally grown in the ground, but also does very well in the 20 L and 38 L Air-Pot containers I grow it in. These not only make growing easier in smaller spaces, but also make harvest incredibly easy — just undo the Air-Pot® wall, loosen the medium and pull out all the rhizomes!

The third photo shows two turmeric plants in 275 mm tall 9 L Air-Pot containers. The turmeric on the left is about a metre higher again, and the one on the right is about 900 mm tall.

I am also seeing excellent results in the hedge bags — photos 4-6 show 1 m tall turmeric in the smaller 20 cm high 40 L hedge bag.
(And again make harvest easier, as they’re quite easy to tip over or empty whilst upright.)

Like all members of the ginger family, turmeric prefers a well-draining soil rich in organic matter in a shady well-protected spot. This is another reason gingers in general do so well in Air-Pot containers, as they naturally create a rich aerobic environment which doesn’t enable water to accumulate as much.

And why it is also doing so well in the hedge bags — I fill these with compost and plant the rhizomes directly in, where they thrive. The bag naturally drains as there are drainage holes in the bag’s bottom, which is resting directly on the ground — water thus does not collect due to gravity as with regular pots, but continues to drain into the soil beneath.

Turmeric is one of the earliest of the ginger family to shoot for me, around early November in this climate. It enters dormancy around June, when the rhizomes can be harvested for eating and replanting.