Job’s tears

Where does Job’s tears grow?

Found in: Africa, American Samoa, Argentina, Asia, Australia, Bhutan, Brazil, Cambodia, Cameroon, Central Africa, Central America, China, Congo DR, Côte d'Ivoire, Cuba, Dominican Republic, East Africa, East Timor, Easter Island, Ecuador, Fiji, Ghana, Guam, Guiana, Guianas, Guinea, Guinée, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Haiti, Himalayas, India, Indochina, Indonesia, Ivory Coast, Japan, Korea, Laos, Liberia, Madagascar, Malaysia, Maldives, Mariana Islands, Marquesas, Mozambique, Myanmar, Nepal, Nigeria, Northeastern India, Pacific, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, PNG, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Sao Tome and Principe, SE Asia, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Singapore, Slovenia, South Africa, Southern Africa, South America, Sri Lanka, St. Kitts and Nevis, Suriname, Taiwan, Thailand, Timor-Leste, Tonga, Trinidad, Vanuatu, Venezuela, Vietnam, West Africa, West Indies

Notes: Chemical composition (grams /100g): Protein = 18.81g. Fat = 6.2g. Carbohydrate (soluble) = 59.55g. Fibre = 1.28g. Ash = 3.4g. Water = 10.74g. Calories = 378.

Status: Common in most areas of Papua New Guinea but rarely eaten. It is eaten often in some places e.g. Mendi Valley. Similarly in many tropical countries, the thin shelled form is used as food. It is a cultivated food plant.

Growing Job’s tears

Cultivation: Plants are grown by seed. It grows wild in many swampy places. Seed are sown 5 cm deep. Plants are spaced at 40-60 cm.

Edible Uses: The seeds are eaten raw. They can be cooked like rice. The seeds can be crushed to produce a cereal flour. This is best mixed with wheat flour to make a lighter but tasty flour. The seeds are used in soups, porridges, drinks or pastries. It is used for brewing beer. The parched seeds are used for a tea-like drink.

Production: Seeds are ready to harvest about 5 months after sowing. On poor soils in dry conditions, hollow fruits may be produced. The tough seed shell has to be broken.

Nutrition Info

Job’s tears Photos

References

References for Job's tears Coix lacryma-jobi.

Altschul, S.V.R., 1973, Drugs and Foods from Little-known Plants. Notes in Harvard University Herbaria. Harvard Univ. Press. Massachusetts. no. 10

Ambasta, S.P. (Ed.), 2000, The Useful Plants of India. CSIR India. p 135

Anderson, E. F., 1993, Plants and people of the Golden Triangle. Dioscorides Press. p 207

Arora, R. K., 2014, Diversity in Underutilized Plant Species - An Asia-Pacific Perspective. Bioversity International. p 102

Bennett, B. C., 1990, Useful Plants of Amazonian Ecuador. US Agency for International Development. Fifth Progress Report. New York Botanical Gardens. p 39

Borrell, O.W., 1989, An Annotated Checklist of the Flora of Kairiru Island, New Guinea. Marcellin College, Victoria Australia. p 22

Bremness, L., 1994, Herbs. Collins Eyewitness Handbooks. Harper Collins. p 242

Brickell, C. (Ed.), 1999, The Royal Horticultural Society A-Z Encyclopedia of Garden Plants. Convent Garden Books. p 286

Brown, D., 2002, The Royal Horticultural Society encyclopedia of Herbs and their uses. DK Books. p 175

Brown, W.H., 1920, Wild Food Plants of the Philippines. Bureau of Forestry Bulletin No. 21 Manila. p 26

Burkill, H. M., 1985, The useful plants of west tropical Africa, Vol. 2. Kew.

Burkill, I.H., 1966, A Dictionary of the Economic Products of the Malay Peninsula. Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Vol 1 (A-H) p 637

Cabalion, P. and Morat, P., 1983, Introduction le vegetation, la flore et aux noms vernaculaires de l'ile de Pentcoste (Vanuatu), In: Journal d'agriculture traditionnelle et de botanique appliquee JATBA Vol. 30, 3-4

Cribb, A.B. & J.W., 1976, Wild Food in Australia, Fontana. p 101

Dobriyal, M. J. R. & Dobriyal, R., 2014, Non Wood Forest Produce an Option for Ethnic Food and Nutritional Security in India. Int. J. of Usuf. Mngt. 15(1):17-37

Ekman Herbarium records Haiti

Ethnobotany of Karbis. Chapter 4 in p 82

Facciola, S., 1998, Cornucopia 2: a Source Book of Edible Plants. Kampong Publications, p 174

Flora of Pakistan. www.eFloras.org

Fox, F. W. & Young, M. E. N., 1982, Food from the Veld. Delta Books. p 298

Franklin, J., Keppel, G., & Whistler, W., 2008, The vegetation and flora of Lakeba, Nayau and Aiwa Islands, Central Lau Group, Fiji. Micronesica 40(1/2): 169–225, 2008

French, B.R., 1986, Food Plants of Papua New Guinea, A Compendium. Asia Pacific Science Foundation p 137

Gangwar, A. K. & Ramakrishnan, P. S., 1990, Ethnobotanical Notes on Some Tribes of Arunachal Pradesh, Northeastern India. Economic Botany, Vol. 44, No. 1 pp. 94-105

Guite, C., 2016, A study of wild edible plants associated with the Paite tribe of Manipur, India, International Journal of Current Research. Vol. 8, Issue, 11, pp. 40927-40932

Hani Medicine of Xishuangbanna, 1999, p 459

Hedrick, U.P., 1919, (Ed.), Sturtevant's edible plants of the world. p 210

Hibbert, M., 2002, The Aussie Plant Finder 2002, Florilegium. p 71

Hu, Shiu-ying, 2005, Food Plants of China. The Chinese University Press. p 287

Hwang, HS, et al, 2014, Distribution characteristics of plant in the Ungseokbong Mountain, Gyeongsangnam-do, Korea. Journal of Asia-Pacific Biodiversity. 7(2014) e164-e178

Jacquat, C., 1990, Plants from the Markets of Thailand. D.K. Book House p 120

Jansen, P.C.M., 2006. Coix lacryma-jobi L. [Internet] Record from Protabase. Brink, M. & Belay, G. (Editors). PROTA (Plant Resources of Tropical Africa), Wageningen, Netherlands. < http://database.prota.org/search.htm>. Accessed 15 October 2009.

Jardin, C., 1970, List of Foods Used In Africa, FAO Nutrition Information Document Series No 2. p 2

Joyal, E., 1987, Ethnobotanical Field Notes from Ecuador: Camp, Prieto, Jorgensen, and Giler. Economic Botany 41(2): 163-189

Kiple, K.F. & Ornelas, K.C., (eds), 2000, The Cambridge World History of Food. CUP p 117, 1793

Kuo, W. H. J., (Ed.) Taiwan's Ethnobotanical Database (1900-2000), http://tk.agron.ntu.edu.tw/ethnobot/DB1.htm

Lazarides, M. & Hince, B., 1993, Handbook of Economic Plants of Australia, CSIRO. p 63

Lokho, K. & Narasimhan, D., 2013, Ethnobotany of Mao-Naga Tribe of Manipur, India. Pleione 7(2): 314-324

Macmillan, H.F. (Revised Barlow, H.S., et al), 1991, Tropical Planting and Gardening. Sixth edition. Malayan Nature Society. Kuala Lumpur. p 351

Manandhar, N.P., 2002, Plants and People of Nepal. Timber Press. Portland, Oregon. p 164

McMakin, P.D., 2000, Flowering Plants of Thailand. A Field Guide. White Lotus. p 93

Miguel, E., et al, 1989, A checklist of the cultivated plants of Cuba. Kulturpflanze 37. 1989, 211-357

Omawale, 1973, Guyana's edible plants. Guyana University, Georgetown p 96

Paczkowska, G. & Chapman, A.R., 2000, The Western Australian Flora. A Descriptive Catalogue. Western Australian Herbarium. p 100

PATON & DUNLOP,

Peekel, P.G., 1984, (Translation E.E.Henty), Flora of the Bismarck Archipelago for Naturalists, Division of Botany, Lae, PNG. p 44, 45

Phon, P., 2000, Plants used in Cambodia. © Pauline Dy Phon, Phnom Penh, Cambodia. p 167

Plants for a Future database, The Field, Penpol, Lostwithiel, Cornwall, PL22 0NG, UK. http://www.scs.leeds.ac.uk/pfaf/

Plants of Haiti Smithsonian Institute http://botany.si.edu/antilles/West Indies

Powell, J.M., Ethnobotany. In Paijmans, K., 1976, New Guinea Vegetation. Australian National University Press. p 109

PROSEA (Plant Resources of South East Asia) handbook, Volume

Purseglove, J.W., 1972, Tropical Crops. Monocotyledons. Longmans p 134

Ramachandran,V. S., & Udhayavani, C., 2013, Knowledge and uses of wild edible plants by Paniyas and Kurumbas of Western Nilgiris, Tamil Nadu. Indian Journal of Natural Products and Resources. 4(4) December 2013, pp 412-418

Recher, P, 2001, Fruit Spirit Botanical Gardens Plant Index. www.nrg.com.au/~recher/ seedlist.html p 1

Reid, L. A. & Madulid, D., 1972, Some comments on Bontoc Ethnobotany. Philippine Journal of Linguistics

Reis, S. V. and Lipp, F. L., 1982, New Plant Sources for Drugs and Foods from the New York Botanical Garden herbarium. Harvard. p 10

Romanowski, N., 2007, Edible Water Gardens. Hyland House. p 85

Ruiters-Welcome, A. K., 2019, Food plants of southern Africa. Ph.D. thesis. Univ. of Johannesburg p 87

Singh, V. and Singh, P., 1981, Edible Wild Plants of Eastern Rajasthan. J. Econ. Tax. Bot. Vol 2 pp 197-207

Smith, P.M., 1979, Adlay, Job’s tears, in Simmonds, N.W., (ed), Crop Plant Evolution. Longmans. London. p 307

Sp. pl. 2:972. 1753

Sujanapal, P., & Sankaran, K. V., 2016, Common Plants of Maldives. FAO & Kerala FRI, p 93

Sukarya, D. G., (Ed.) 2013, 3,500 Plant Species of the Botanic Gardens of Indonesia. LIPI p 1090

Swapna, M. M. et al, 2011, A review on the medicinal and edible aspects of aquatic and wetland plants of India. J. Med. Plants Res. 5 (33) pp. 7163-7176

Terashima, H., et al, 1992, Ethnobotany of the Lega in the Tropical Rainforest of Eastern Zaire (Congo): Part Two, Zone de Walikale, African Study Monographs, Suppl. 19:1-60

Teron, R. & Borthakur, S. K., 2016, Edible Medicines: An Exploration of Medicinal Plants in Dietary Practices of Karbi Tribal Population of Assam, Northeast India. In Mondal, N. & Sen, J.(Ed.) Nutrition and Health among tribal populations of India. p 154

van Wyk, B., 2005, Food Plants of the World. An illustrated guide. Timber press. p 148

van Wyk, Be, & Gericke, N., 2007, People's plants. A Guide to Useful Plants of Southern Africa. Briza. p 9

Wiriadinata, H., 1995, Ethnobotany of Economic Plants in the Baliem Valley, Jayawijaya, Irian Jaya, Indonesian Institute of Science, Bogor, Indonesia

World Checklist of Useful Plant Species 2020. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew

www.ethnobiomed.com

Zhang, Y., et al, 2014, Diversity of wetland plants used traditionally in China: a literature review. Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine. 10:72

Zizka, G., 1991, Flowering Plants of Easter Island. Palmarum Hortus Francofurtensis