Centratherum punctatum Cassini

   Centratherum punctatum Cassini

Family : Asteraceae

Botanical Name : Centratherum punctatum Cass. subsp. punctatum

Common name : Brazilian button Flower

Stems erect, 10-70 cm tall.

Altitudinal range from 400-740 m. Found on the edges of vine forest and rainforest and in some drier types of open forest and woodland and roadsides.

Guadeloupe, Dominica, Martinique, St. Lucia, Greater Antilles (Puerto Rico), Mesoamerica, South America. Central America ,West Indies

Thorny Nightshade (Solanum virginianum)

കാന്താരി ചുണ്ട 

Common name: Thorny Nightshade, Yellow Berried Nightshade, Thai eggplant

Botanical name: Solanum virginianum   

Family: Solanaceae (Potato family)

Synonyms: Solanum surattense, Solanum xanthocarpum

Thorny Nightshade is a herb which is erect or creeping, sometimes woody at base, 50-70 cm tall, copiously armed with sturdy, needlelike, broad-based prickles 0.5-2 cm × 0.5-1.5 mm. Leaves are unequal paired; stalk 2-3.5 cm, prickly; leaf blade ovate-oblong, 4-9 × 2-4.5 cm, prickly along veins, margin usually 5-9-lobed or pinnately parted, lobes unequal, sinuate, apex acute. Inflorescences elongate racemes 4-7 cm. Sepal tube is bell-shaped 1 cm in diameter. Flowers blue-purple, 1.4-1.6 × 2.5 cm; petals ovate-deltate, 6-8 mm, densely pubescent with stellate hairs. Filaments 1 mm; anthers 8 mm. Style 1 cm. Fruiting pedicel 2-3.6 cm, with prickles and sparse stellate hairs. Fruiting sepals prickly, sparsely pubescent. Berry pale yellow, 1.3-2.2 cm in diameter. Flowering: November-May.

Medicinal uses:  Boiled decoction (കഷായം) of dry plant is prescribed for stomach and liver complaints

pic/2009 MH   

Clasping-Leaf Borage (Trichodesma inaequale)

Clasping-Leaf Borage

Botanical name: Trichodesma inaequale    

Family: Boraginaceae (Forget-me-not family)

Synonyms: Trichodesma amplexicaule

Clasping-Leaf Borage is an erect hairy herb with scattered hairs. Lower leaves are oppositely arranged, stalkless. linear-oblong. Upper ones are alternately arranged, heart-shaped, stem-clasping, broadly ovate, long pointed. Flowers appear singly, laterally on branches or opposite the leaves. Sepals are shortly and obtusely eared. Flowers are pale blue with rounded petals which are flat, with a point at the tip. Flower throat is hairy. Clasping-Leaf Borage found in Mumbai and neighbouring area. This flowers is closely similar to Indian Borage, but can be distinguished by two features - one, leaves are stem-clasping, they are only half-clasping in Indian Borage; two, the stamens do not protrude out, whereas in Indian Borage they protrude out.

Pic 2009/ MH,GUJ border