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Cup-Shaped Osbeckia
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Cup-Shaped Osbeckia
ative Photo: Vinaya Kumar
Common name: Cup-Shaped Osbeckia
Botanical name: Osbeckia brachystemon    Family: Melastomataceae (Melastome family)
Synonyms: Osbeckia cupularis, Osbeckia coronata, Osbeckia leschenaultiana Dalz. & Gibs.

Cup-Shaped Osbeckia is an erect herb with leaves opposite, 1.5-3 x 1-1.8 cm, ovate or elliptic, thin leathery, densely strigose, 3-ribbed, base blunt, margin entire, tip pointed, leaf-stalk 4 mm, strigose. Flowers are borne in umbel-like cymes, at branch-ends, also in leaf-axils, 2 x 2 cm. Flowers are 8 mm wide, flower-stalk 2 mm. Sepals tube is urn-shaped, 6 x 4 mm, equal to flower; bristle hairs clusters, also scattered, sepals 4, lanceshaped. Petals are 4, white with pink blotches, somewhat heart-shaped, 5 x 5 mm. Stamens are 8; filaments 4 mm; anthers ovoid, lobed basally, not beaked. Ovary is 4 celled, subapically strigose, basally with 8 tongue shaped appendages, adnate to calyx tube; style 4 mm, curved. Capsules are urn-shaped; seeds numerous. Cup-Shaped Osbeckia is endemic to Southern Western Ghats. Flowering: October-December.

Identification credit: Siddarth Machado Photographed in Kerala & Tamil Nadu.

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