Although you will read on many soap nuts informational pages that the Sapindus Mukorossi tree is native to India, the fact is that the tree is native to China and considered an alien plant by Indian botanists.
Perhaps this is the reason that soap nuts are more properly identified as Chinese Soap Berries. They are, as just stated, native to China and also a berry which produce a soap like substance called saponin.
How they came to propagate in India, Indonesia, or Japan is something I have yet to uncover, but given the early trade routes and nomadic tribes it is reasonable to assume that the soap nuts were carried by either man or animals from their origins in China to the connected lands within Asia. All one need do to confirm the soundness of this assumption is take a look at a world map. The Himalayas border South Eastern China, Nepal, and North Western India. This is the exact region most well known for soap nuts. It would have taken no more than a trade caravan to have carried these Chinese Soap Berries through the Himalayas and into Nepal and India.
Now moving into more recent history when did soap nuts begin to make their appearance in North America? Well again despite so many sites claiming they are the ones who introduced us all to soap nuts in 2004 or so, I again offer some facts rather than marketing boasts.
According to an article which appeared in Scientific American in approximately 1921 a man named Edward Moulie, who once resided in Florida (and may be responsible for the Florida Soapberry sub species) began a campaign to combat the emerging soap manufacturing business with a sustainable chemical free alternative. The soap nut was Mr. Moulie’s alternative.
Excerpted below is what I have found about Mr. Moulie and his campaign to bring soap nuts into the homes of americans and to begin the propagation of them in the US and in fact other parts of the world.
A Rival of the Soap Industry
A Tree That Needs Advertising
Our old friend, E. Moulie, who used to be in Florida, but who is now established in San Gabriel, Cal., asks us to assist him in what he believes will be his last distribution of the seed of his beloved soap-nut tree.
This tree, Sapindus Musko- rossi, to give it its botanical name, is some fifty feet tall when fully developed, and quite ornamental. Its timber resembles orange wood. It bears from the age of six years, the average crop being about 200 pounds of nuts per tree.
These nuts are altogether extraordinary. It is the shell of the nut that gives the tree its name; this shell is so rich in saponaceous material that the un-cracked nut, right from the tree, can be used with excellent effect to wash the hands. This saponine of the hull washes everything from a lace handkerchief to a horse blanket, and is highly beneficial to the human skin as well as to the scalp. Inside is found an edible kernel, extremely rich in fats and high in food value.
Mr. Moulie has spent a good part of his long life (he is in his eighty-first year) in the effort to bring the soap-nut tree into more general cultivation in all places that are suited to it. On several occasions, after he has succeeded in accumulating from his own plantation a supply of the sufficient for the purpose, he has conducted free distribution of the seed with great success.
The soap-nut tree will not prosper in regions where the thermometer may be expected to drop below ten degrees, Fahrenheit, and Mr. Moulie will not send seeds to such localities. With this exception he is eager to have applications for the seed from any part of the world. The last time he distributed the seed he had so many requests that the labor and the expense of filling them nearly swamped him.
He therefore insists that all applications be accompanied by self-addressed stamped envelopes, plus ten cents to cover clerical work, etc. In return each applicant will receive ten tested soap-nut seeds, which will be sufficient nucleus for an extensive orchard. Mr. Moulie suggests that applicants from foreign countries send the ten cents in international postage coupons if United States stamps are not obtainable.
The seed will -germinate sooner if planted in a hot bed, in a box or pot. The seed should be planted one and one-half inches deep and the soil about it kept moderately moist. When the seeding is about eighteen inches tall it can be planted at the point in the open where it is desired to have the tree. It must be placed at least twenty-five feet from any other large tree, and the soil again kept moderately moist until the roots are well settled and the tree has started a healthy growthIt is to be emphasized that Mr. Moulie’s object in asking us to make this announcement is to spread as widely as possible the cultivation of the tree over which he is so enthusiastic.
His distribution of 1918 was marked by numerous requests for the nuts in such quantities that it was plainly the intention of the applicants to use them for soap or for food—one lady actually asked for instructions as to their preparation for the table. Mr. Moulie is giving away seeds, not food; and he is giving them in such a way as to give them the maximum circulation. He will not undertake to acknowledge any letters that do not meet his conditions. In particular, do not ask for his nuts by the pound or the bushel; the supply is not unlimited, though Mr. Moulie believes it is large enough to insure ten of the tested seeds to everybody who wants them. But from the figure which he names in his letter, if you are the 6,001st applicant you may not get any seeds.
—Scientific American.
So as early as 1918 Mr. Moulie was actually growing soap nut trees on a plantation somewhere in either Florida or California. The location of the original soap nuts plantation is not clear in the article.
Now you will no doubt notice several things in this article that became the basis for the information someone entered into Wikipedia and which began to be copied and pasted verbatim across hundreds of websites. It seems that few if any of the people who copied and pasted that information have actually ever handled a soap nut (soap berry) or seen a tree up close because if they had they would not continue to describe what many of us now use as a natural laundry detergent as the hull of a soap nut.
I’ll cover more about that on our soap nuts FAQ page where I’ll get into details and share the facts and bust more myths about what soap nuts are and their benefits.
In honor and tribute to the forward thinking of Mr. Moulie I will be offering 5 soap nuts seeds to the first 10 buyers from my wholesale bulk soap nuts store.
If you want to try to propagate your own Soap Nut trees and have the patience to wait 6-9 years to see them bear soap berries then visit our wholesale bulk soap nuts store and place your order.
Soap Nuts History
Although you will read on many soap nuts informational pages that the Sapindus Mukorossi tree is native to India, the fact is that the tree is native to China and considered an alien plant by Indian botanists.
Perhaps this is the reason that soap nuts are more properly identified as Chinese Soap Berries. They are, as just stated, native to China and also a berry which produce a soap like substance called saponin.
How they came to propagate in India, Indonesia, or Japan is something I have yet to uncover, but given the early trade routes and nomadic tribes it is reasonable to assume that the soap nuts were carried by either man or animals from their origins in China to the connected lands within Asia. All one need do to confirm the soundness of this assumption is take a look at a world map. The Himalayas border South Eastern China, Nepal, and North Western India. This is the exact region most well known for soap nuts. It would have taken no more than a trade caravan to have carried these Chinese Soap Berries through the Himalayas and into Nepal and India.
Now moving into more recent history when did soap nuts begin to make their appearance in North America? Well again despite so many sites claiming they are the ones who introduced us all to soap nuts in 2004 or so, I again offer some facts rather than marketing boasts.
According to an article which appeared in Scientific American in approximately 1921 a man named Edward Moulie, who once resided in Florida (and may be responsible for the Florida Soapberry sub species) began a campaign to combat the emerging soap manufacturing business with a sustainable chemical free alternative. The soap nut was Mr. Moulie’s alternative.
Excerpted below is what I have found about Mr. Moulie and his campaign to bring soap nuts into the homes of americans and to begin the propagation of them in the US and in fact other parts of the world.
A Rival of the Soap Industry
A Tree That Needs Advertising
Our old friend, E. Moulie, who used to be in Florida, but who is now established in San Gabriel, Cal., asks us to assist him in what he believes will be his last distribution of the seed of his beloved soap-nut tree.
This tree, Sapindus Musko- rossi, to give it its botanical name, is some fifty feet tall when fully developed, and quite ornamental. Its timber resembles orange wood. It bears from the age of six years, the average crop being about 200 pounds of nuts per tree.
These nuts are altogether extraordinary. It is the shell of the nut that gives the tree its name; this shell is so rich in saponaceous material that the un-cracked nut, right from the tree, can be used with excellent effect to wash the hands. This saponine of the hull washes everything from a lace handkerchief to a horse blanket, and is highly beneficial to the human skin as well as to the scalp. Inside is found an edible kernel, extremely rich in fats and high in food value.
Mr. Moulie has spent a good part of his long life (he is in his eighty-first year) in the effort to bring the soap-nut tree into more general cultivation in all places that are suited to it. On several occasions, after he has succeeded in accumulating from his own plantation a supply of the sufficient for the purpose, he has conducted free distribution of the seed with great success.
The soap-nut tree will not prosper in regions where the thermometer may be expected to drop below ten degrees, Fahrenheit, and Mr. Moulie will not send seeds to such localities. With this exception he is eager to have applications for the seed from any part of the world. The last time he distributed the seed he had so many requests that the labor and the expense of filling them nearly swamped him.
He therefore insists that all applications be accompanied by self-addressed stamped envelopes, plus ten cents to cover clerical work, etc. In return each applicant will receive ten tested soap-nut seeds, which will be sufficient nucleus for an extensive orchard. Mr. Moulie suggests that applicants from foreign countries send the ten cents in international postage coupons if United States stamps are not obtainable.
The seed will -germinate sooner if planted in a hot bed, in a box or pot. The seed should be planted one and one-half inches deep and the soil about it kept moderately moist. When the seeding is about eighteen inches tall it can be planted at the point in the open where it is desired to have the tree. It must be placed at least twenty-five feet from any other large tree, and the soil again kept moderately moist until the roots are well settled and the tree has started a healthy growthIt is to be emphasized that Mr. Moulie’s object in asking us to make this announcement is to spread as widely as possible the cultivation of the tree over which he is so enthusiastic.
His distribution of 1918 was marked by numerous requests for the nuts in such quantities that it was plainly the intention of the applicants to use them for soap or for food—one lady actually asked for instructions as to their preparation for the table. Mr. Moulie is giving away seeds, not food; and he is giving them in such a way as to give them the maximum circulation. He will not undertake to acknowledge any letters that do not meet his conditions. In particular, do not ask for his nuts by the pound or the bushel; the supply is not unlimited, though Mr. Moulie believes it is large enough to insure ten of the tested seeds to everybody who wants them. But from the figure which he names in his letter, if you are the 6,001st applicant you may not get any seeds.
—Scientific American.
So as early as 1918 Mr. Moulie was actually growing soap nut trees on a plantation somewhere in either Florida or California. The location of the original soap nuts plantation is not clear in the article.
Now you will no doubt notice several things in this article that became the basis for the information someone entered into Wikipedia and which began to be copied and pasted verbatim across hundreds of websites. It seems that few if any of the people who copied and pasted that information have actually ever handled a soap nut (soap berry) or seen a tree up close because if they had they would not continue to describe what many of us now use as a natural laundry detergent as the hull of a soap nut.
I’ll cover more about that on our soap nuts FAQ page where I’ll get into details and share the facts and bust more myths about what soap nuts are and their benefits.
In honor and tribute to the forward thinking of Mr. Moulie I will be offering 5 soap nuts seeds to the first 10 buyers from my wholesale bulk soap nuts store.
If you want to try to propagate your own Soap Nut trees and have the patience to wait 6-9 years to see them bear soap berries then visit our wholesale bulk soap nuts store and place your order.