Nilambur Cobra Lily is a rare and threatened herb from
Southern Western Ghats, carrying a single compound leaf. It is name for
the Nilambur region of Kerala where the plant was first located and
named. Corms are up to 2 cm across. Leaf is digitately compound.
Leaflets are 5-6 in number, up to 16 x 8 cm, ovate to elliptic,
tapering, base wedge-shaped, membranous. Leaf-stalk is up to 45 cm,
base sheathing the flower-cluster-stalk. Flowers appear along with
leaves, carried on flower-cluster-stalk up to 16 cm tall. The
inflorescence is shaped like the hood of a cobra, hence the common
name. Spathe or the hood is about 7 cm long; greenish purple, limb with
a tail-tapering, incurved, about 5 cm long. Spadix, about 9 cm long, is
bent at the tip. Male flowers are scattered at base in male spadix,
stamens 4, kidney-shaped; female flowers crowded at base; neuters few
above the female; ovary oblong, flat at tip with stalkless stigma.
Nilambur Cobra Lily is endemic to Southern Western Ghats. Flowering:
June-September.
Identification credit: P.S. Sivaprasad
Photographed in Silent Valley National Park, Kerala.
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The flower labeled Nilambur Cobra Lily is ...