Required Plant Types

Since there is limited access to the insides of the biosphere once it is closed up, it is important to plant plants that stay established.  It's best to use perennial vegetables where they come back year after year.  Below is a list of perennial vegetables that can be eaten by a gerbil or mouse and still survive.  All plants have been acquired over the years and are not being tested for growing in the biosphere IV.

Most of these plants are Vietnamese herbs.  They can be grown from seeds and/or acquired in pots at Vietnamese grocery stores.

Plant List

Rice paddy herb

Limnophila aromatica

Mexican coriander, thorny coriander, culantro, saw-leaf herb, saw-tooth herb, recao, Tabasco parsley 

Eryngium foetidum

Vietnamese coriander, hot mint, daun laksa, daun kakok, daun kesum, laksa leaf

Polygonum odoratum

Vap ca, Fish mint, fishscale mint

Houttuynia cordata

Sorrel (oseille in French)

Rumex family