While on a research assignment in August of 2017, Dr Muna Ismail made an unexpected discovery about the Yeheb plant.

“I was told that Huute, an old man with a green thumb had been trailing Yeheb in his 20x20m back garden.”

In 2014, Huute was inspired to collect yeheb seeds from his native Galmudug region of Somalia, where it was growing wild. He was illiterate, so he asked his son to write the dates of the planting on a corrugated iron wall inside their home compound.

After eighteen months, he collected another batch of seeds from the same region, and planted a second round of plants in his garden, with his son recording the dates once again.

“When I met Huute in August, he told me that he had a harvest of the first batch, and showed me the dates on the wall. I discovered that it was exactly three years.”

It was new evidence that if the right conditions are met, in this case shade, fencing and just little water for the seedlings to grow, then yeheb can be grown outside of its natural habitat,

“This reassured me that nature delivers.”

Watch the video below to see yeheb growing in Huute’s garden: