Bromeliad Flowers

The Friendship Plant or Queen's Tears Billbergia nutans, a grass like plant, bursts into flowers in autumn and spring. The pink bracts are very striking- no less the dark blue and green flower. Since it is an epiphyte, it can be grown on a tree.

The Pyramid Billbergia, Billbergia pyramydalis has no such time restrictions. It flowers whenever it feels like, throughout the year. One has to protect the flowers from marauding snails.

The Matchstick Plant, Aechmea gamosepala is also flowering now. The small plants are easy to propagate, as they give forth lots of pups.I have lined a border with them. They don't seem to flower profusely when planted in the ground.

Oil from Plants

Humans have been extracting oil from plants since pre-historic times. More and more uses have been found for the vegetable oils.

Jatropha, the plant with the red flowers, yields an oil which is used as a substitute for deisel in some parts of the world. I visited an organic farm called Navadarshanam near Bangalore, where they use the Jatropha oil to run their flour mill. The waste is composted.

There are innumerable uses for the coconut oil, which has been known to humans for millenia. Coconut oil is used as a cooking medium, for the preparation of beauty aids, as an addition to food, for making soap, in industry...

The tree you see on the right hand corner is the sandalwood tree. It gives a very precious oil which is used in the perfume industry, and also for religious purposes by the Hindus and the Buddhists.

Snake Repellant Rue

A nursery near my house specializes in the 'snake repellant' Garden Rue Ruta graveolens. The owner of the nursery confessed to me that snakes slither past the rue, but people believe the malodorous plant to be snake repellant, and plant it in many places in their gardens.

The plant has lime yellow flowers, which also have the same oily smell. The leaves are feathey and bluish green.

The plant has many uses in Ayurveda. The leaves are used for curing cough, cold and influenza. The oil from the plant is very effective in alleviating rheumatic pains.

Canna indica

Canna indica, the Indian Shot is not a native of India as its name suggests, but of the West Indies. It has attractive flowers ranging from yellow to a deep red. Its leaves are large and sometimes variegated.
The Canna has naturalized itself in India, and can be seen growing wild along riverbanks and along canals.The seeds are hard , black spheres reminding of pellets of a shot gun. Hence the name Indian Shot.
The seeds are used for making jewelry. In Vietnam, noodles are made from the Canna plant. In China, a wine is made using the flowers of the Canna.

The Castor Plant

Many of us have orally taken caster oil as a medicine and hated it. Castor oil is taken out from the seeds of the castor plant, Ricinus communis.The plant, although originally from Ethiopia, has naturalized itself in India and other parts of the world. India is the largest producer of castor oil, followed by China.

The castor plant grows in all sorts of inhospitable places. Although some cultivars of it are grown by gardeners for the colour and shape of the leaves, one must remember that it is a highly poisonous plant. 8 to 10 seeds of the castor plant can kill a man. The poison recin is in the husk.

Castor oil has been used as a medicine since 2ooo B.C. to cure arthritis .

In Brazil, it is used as a biodiesel. Castor oil is used as a lubricant for racing cars.

Vinca, the Always Cheerful

In India, Vinca is known as Sadabahar, which means always cheerful. Ihe plant has flowers throughout the year. It does not need any special care . It thrives in poor soils also.
The flowers are many colours , the most common being the white and the pink . Vinca which is a tropical and subtropical plant has been used in Indian and Chinese traditional medicine since centuries. In India, it is used to treat diabetes and malaria and for insect bites. It is also used to treat certain cancers. The substances, Vinblastine and Vincristine obtained from Vinca are used in the treatment of leukemia. The patenting of medicines from vinca has given rise to controversy as Vinca has been used for thousands of years in India and China for its medicinal properties.

Butterfly Pea

The butterfly Pea, Clitoria ternatea, is a wild flower which one encounters on walks in the woods. It has two colours, white and blue. There is a single and a double variety too. It is called Shankha Pushpa ( conch flower) in Sanskrit and Kannada.

The roots of the butterfly pea are used for curing whooping cough in children. The blue flowers are used as a food dye. The extract from plant is known to have anti oxidant properties.

The flowers are used in Ayurveda to enhance memory and sharpen the intelligence.

The Shankha Pushpa is the favourite flower of Ganesha, the Hindu god of success.