What it is
Common Mallow (Malva neglecta) is in the Malvaceae (Mallow) family. A mild lawn weed in the okra family - leaves and the little cheese seed pods are edible and slightly mucilaginous.
How to grow it
It wants full sun to part shade, water it any, and give it any soil. Target a soil pH around Adaptable. Expect roughly Spring-summer. Annual/biennial weed.
How it's used
Common Mallow is used: leaves, shoots, and cheeses.
🔎 How to identify it
- Round scalloped leaves
- Sprawling stems
- Tiny round seed pods (cheeses)
Edibility
How to grow & propagate common mallow
Everything I've worked out about starting this one, keeping it alive through a Texas year, and turning one plant into many — free.
How to propagate common mallow
The mallow family loves heat. Sow the seed once the soil is thoroughly warm — soaking it overnight helps the hard coat — and give it full sun. The perennial members (Turk's cap, rock rose) also root from softwood cuttings taken in early summer.
Growing common mallow in Texas
Give it full sun to part shade and any soil. Match the spot to the plant and most of the battle is already won.
Time your planting to our long warm season and watch the frost dates at both ends; the live weather tool on this site is built for exactly that.
Keep moisture even, especially while it's young — deep, less-frequent soaks build better roots than a daily sprinkle.
Harvesting
Figure on roughly spring-summer before you're harvesting. The part you're after: leaves, shoots, seed pods.
Making more for free
Every seed we sell is open-pollinated, which means you can save your own from the best plants and it'll grow true next year. Let a few of your strongest plants finish and go to seed, dry it fully, and store it cool and dark. That's the whole point of heirlooms — buy once, grow forever.
Before you forage it
A safety note, because this one grows wild: positive identification comes before anything goes in your mouth or your medicine. Confirm it on several features — leaf, stem, flower, smell — not a single resemblance, check the lookalike warnings, and never forage from roadsides or sprayed ground. When in doubt, leave it out.
Part of the free Texas Roots plant database, compiled by Jordan Polasek from his greenhouse in El Campo, Texas. Free to read and share. If it helped, the best thanks is to grow something.