Can Apios americana or ground nut handle shady conditions?

Hello friends. I recently read about the American groundnut. Intrigued I bought some seed. I have read that they like moist soil like by a stream. Do any of you know if it can handle shade? It's a legume also. Are the above ground parts edible as well? Any advice for planting, growing, harvesting, or eating is welcomed.

Hi, yes it can do well with quite alot of shade .. The tubers are the main edible part .. Sometimes pea pods form but not always ..

Thank you Larz. I can't believe a wild edible has escaped my notice for so long. Can't wait to try them.

Did you buy ground nut seeds or tubers ?

finding seeds is not easy and many plants do not produce seeds. If you have a seed source, I would be interested in knowing where I can get some. There was a seed supplier in Burgaw NC quite a few years ago but the last time I talked to him, he said he no longer can get seeds as that land was sold.

I actually found a seed source in the wild, but it seems fairly unusual in my experience .. I did sprout some from seeds and I sent some of the seeds to a nursery in Ohio

Once you get a plant or two growing, then go looking for them in the wild as you will know what they look like

I actually found the seed on eBay. Purchased six seeds for seven dollars.

I did not see seeds on ebay .. Perhaps you ordered tubers ?

There's other plants in Africa called groundnut as well as peanut which is sometimes refereed to as groundnut, you ordered from ebay where it said "Apios Americana" ?

Yep they're seeds. Sitting here looking at them. They are apious Americana.

Do you have a return address, supplier name or anything on that ? ground nut seeds are a very unusual find. Ken over at Oikos runs a nursery business and he has never been able to find a seed supplier.

Most all places sell tubers rather than seeds

Here you go my friend.

Thanks alot, that's very interesting

Very interesting, thanks for posting this!

Does anyone have advice for companions / guilds with groundnut?  Maybe pawpaw?

Hi Steven. From what I've read about them it does seem like Paw Paw would be a good companion. I also saw someplace that sun chokes would be as well. I'm not sure why as they would compete for space. I'm planning on planting mine with wintergreen, and Chinese magnolia (it produces a tasty fruit we dry and use for tea.) They share similar habitats.

Steven Kovacs wrote:Very interesting, thanks for posting this!

Does anyone have advice for companions / guilds with groundnut?  Maybe pawpaw?

This thread talks about the "Three Brothers Guild" https://permies.com/t/56167/Shawn-brothers. Basically, ground nut grows best when it can grow UP something. The subchokes act as that trelis, and another plant (like wild ginger) is used as ground cover. And, when you go to harvest, you get both plants at once.

At least last year on my property, this didn't work out very well. Ground nuts like wet ground and sunchokes not so much. Though I planted both in the same 20x2 foot row, the places that the ground nuts grew, there were no sunchokes, and where the sunchokes grew, there were no ground nuts. It was really weird! Hopefully this year they'll grow together!

Great post, Nicole. I also live in PNW and we don't get the heat that other regions do.  Back east in the summer, it's hot all day and hot all night.   I am guessing that ground nut is more productive in those areas than here. I grew it for awhile, and it kind of maintained itself, but didn't produce a great bounty.
John S
PDX OR

Well there you go Nicole. Makes perfect sense now.
Here in NC it stops raining in April and starts back in December, (at least the last two years.) I had to transplant most of my sunchokes to a shady, damp spot to get any decent sized tubers. I may plant some groundnut seeds in that patch of chokes and see what happens. I've got only and handful of seed so the main thing this year is getting them started. Thank you both for your input.

I have seen groundnuts grow in places where the ground was not that wet ..