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Pansy Balsam
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Pansy Balsam
A Native Photo: Krishan Lal
Common name: Pansy Balsam
Botanical name: Impatiens violoides    Family: Balsaminaceae (Balsam family)

Pansy Balsam is an annual herb with stems erect, leaves alternate, ovate, margins rounded toothed, tip tapering. Inflorescence is inverted, in leaf-axils, in the upper parts of the plant, few flowered stalked umbels. Flowers are bisexual, zygomorphic, flower-stalk slender, bracts linear, persistent, about 3 mm long. Sepals are 3, overlapping, 2 lateral ones flat, small, ovate, posterior sepal (lip) large, petal-like, boat-shaped, not spurred. Lateral petals (wings) are fused in pairs, bilobed, basal lobes ovate, rounded. Stamens are 5, alternating with petals, free or fused towards the tip, fused or nearly so, somewhat like a ring surrounding the style and stigma, filaments broad and short, anthers bi-locular. Ovary is 5 locular, superior. Fruit does not split open, is a club-shaped capsule, deflexed, hairless. Pansy Balsam is known from Western Himalaya.

Identification credit: Wojciech Adamowski Photographed in Chansil pass, Himachal Pradesh.

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