Water mimosa greens

Name and identity

Kew accepts Neptunia oleracea Lour. in Fabaceae and lists Laos within its range. Sources use different Lao spellings: Pha Tad Ke prints phak kasèt, while the Luang Prabang market paper records phak ka sed for voucher WA 72415. The names stay attached to their own source records; they are not a general identification rule.

The Lao vascular checklist prints Neptunia oleracea and Neptunia prostrata as separate entries. PROSEA's 1993 profile treats N. prostrata as a synonym of N. oleracea. The checklist specimens listed under N. prostrata have not been reidentified here under Kew's current treatment.

Lao food records

A 2006 village-use study in Bak and Nakhou, Savannakhet Province, lists N. oleracea as a marsh plant eaten cooked as a vegetable and describes shoots sold in Bak markets. A separate Luang Prabang market survey records green parts used raw and in bamboo soup. Its table links the entry to voucher WA 72415 and marks observations in June, August, November and February. The paper's DNA barcoding methods concern fungi, not this plant row.

Pha Tad Ke describes young leaves and tender branches in raw or blanched use with spicy sauce, pickled as som phak, and in soups and stir-fries. It attributes a sour-soup and yam pha krachet account to a Thai neighbor; those dishes are not presented as Lao informant reports.

Reported cultivation in Thailand

The 1993 PROSEA profile describes full sun, hot and humid conditions, and a preference for 30–80 cm of slow-moving water. It reports poorer growth with shade, brackish water or saline soil. Its cultivation section says Thai growers conventionally use stem cuttings 50–150 cm long; it gives a May planting period and a 4–6 month crop. The first harvest is reported at 3–4 weeks, followed by 5–7 day intervals during that crop period. These are source-era Thai production details, not Laos measurements or home-growing targets.

The Savannakhet village-use study places the plant in marsh and paddy-field settings. The Luang Prabang survey reports market observations in four separate months. These records provide Lao habitat and market context but do not describe a measured local crop or a planting calendar.

Food reports and their limits

The accounts name raw, blanched, cooked, soup, stir-fry and pickled uses, but do not provide one complete batch with quantities, yield, ordered steps, process endpoint and storage conditions. The reports are descriptive food records, not an executable recipe or validated preservation method.

No inspected source establishes a Lao frost threshold, soil pH, water-quality limit, household container method, greenhouse system, crop yield or collection permission. The Thai cultivation figures cannot fill those gaps.

Research gaps

No complete source-batched household recipe with quantities, yield, ordered steps, endpoint and storage was established.

The source-era treatment of Neptunia prostrata differs from the current Kew record; listed checklist and market specimens have not been independently reidentified.

The detailed cultivation values are Thai-specific. No Laos crop trial, home container or greenhouse protocol was found.

No frost response, soil pH, water-quality threshold, current collection permission or local conservation assessment was established.

The 2013 Houaphan paper's full text and candidate-specific table evidence were not available in this review.

Research status

The underlying plant account received a partial source review. Its review scope is described in the original plant article.