| Tyrian Red Balsam |
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| File size | 448606 |
| Original date | 10/1/10 12:10 PM |
| Resolution | 2736 x 3648 |
| Flash | Flash fired, red-eye reduction |
| Focal length | 6.4mm |
| Exposure time | 1/60s |
| Aperture | 9.0 |
| Focus Distance | |
| Metering Mode | Multi-segment |
| Camera make | Canon |
| Camera model | Canon PowerShot A2000 IS |
| Sensor type | OneChipColorArea |
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Photo: |
Botanical name: Impatiens phoenicea Family: Balsaminaceae (Balsam family)
Tyrian Red Balsam is a beautiful and striking
species from Southern Western Ghats, and has potential to be cultivated
as a garden plant. It is a woody erect herb, 0.3-1 m tall, branched or
not, hairless. Leaves are alternate, lanceshaped or ovate, narrowed at
both ends, bristly rounded toothed-sawtoothed, incurved, 5-15 x 2.5-3.5
cm, dark-green, shining; leaf-stalks 1.5 - 2.5 cm long.
Flower-cluster-stalks arise in leaf-axils, as long as leaves, slender,
erect; bracts at base of flower-stalks, ovate, heart-shaped,
persistent. Flowers are about 2.5 cm long, brilliant scarlet, yellow in
centre. Lateral sepals obliquely ovate. Lip with spur blood-crimson,
trumpet-shaped, incurved with swollen tip. Standard scarlet, broad,
ovate. Wings scarlet, yellow at base, small; basal lobes heart-shaped,
overlap-ping the larger oblong, distal lobes. Capsules are 4-5-seeded;
seeds compressed-furrowed, about 3 mm long, light brown. Tyrian Red
Balsam is endemic to Southern Western Ghats, south of Pulneys and High
Ranges of Kerala, sholas above 1,500 m, in Tamil Nadu and Kerala.
Flowering: May-November.
| Identification credit: Shrishail Kulloli, A G Pandurangan, R Ramasubbu | Photographed in Kerala. |
• Is this flower misidentified? If yes,