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Hairy Fruit Balsam
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Hairy Fruit Balsam
A Native Photo: Shrishail Kulloli
Common name: Hairy Fruit Balsam • Kannada: Kaadu karna kundala
Botanical name: Impatiens trichocarpa    Family: Balsaminaceae (Balsam family)

Hairy Fruit Balsam is an annual herb 20-60 cm high, branching, appressed hairy. Leaves are alternate, nearly stalkless, elliptic-lanceshaped, pointed, serrulate along margins, 4-7 x 2.5-3.5 cm, leathery. Flowers are solitary or paired, flower-stalks 1-1.5 cm long, hairless or finely velvet-hairy. Lateral sepals are ovate, pointed. Lip is boat-shaped, about 8 mm long, velvet-hairy. Spur is about 2 cm, shorter than lip, robust, incurved. Standard is round, about 7 mm across, hoodlike, keeled on dorsal side ending into a mucro. Wings are about 1.2 cm long, bilobed; basal lobes rounded; distal lobes larger than basal ones, semilunate or dolabriform; dorsal ear prominent, decurved. Capsules are ellipsoid, 1 - 1.2 cm long, turgid, woolly; seeds spherical, about 2 mm, papillose. Hairy Fruit Balsam is endemic to W. Ghats: Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. Flowering: August-December.

Identification credit: Shrishail Kulloli Photographed in Karnataka.

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