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Parrot Olax
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Parrot Olax
ative Photo: Dinesh Valke
Common name: Parrot Olax, Sprawling Olax • Bengali: ককো আরু Koko-Aru • Gondi: अरदफरी Aradphari, कोरपा बाजी Korpa Bhaji • Hindi: कटीहरी Katihari, ढेनिआनी Dheniani • Kannada: ಬಾಪನಮುಷ್ಠಿ Baapanamushti, ಕರಡು Karadu • Kui: Madalkura • Marathi: हरतफरी Haratfari, हरडुली Harduli, उर्चिर्री Urchirri • Odia: ବଦର Badara, ଭଦଭଦଳିଆ Bhadabhadalia • Santal: ᱦᱩᱱᱰ Hund • Tamil: கடலிறஞ்சி Kataliranci • Telugu: బాపనముష్టి Baapanamushti, మురికి మల్లె Muriki Malle, తురకవేప Turakavepa Source: Names of Plants in India
Botanical name: Olax scandens    Family: Olacaceae (Olax family)
Synonyms: Fissilia psittacorum, Olax psittacorum (Willd.) Vahl

Parrot Olax is a large rambling or climbing shrubs; branches reddish-yellow velvet-hairy, old branches armed; thorns blunt. Leaves are elliptic or ovate-oblong, up to 9.5 x 3.4 cm, blunt, entire, hairless above, hairless or finely velvet-hairy beneath; leaf-stalk about 0.8 cm long, velvet-hairy. Flowers are white, in short, in leaf-axils, solitary velvet-hairy- densely short hairy racemes, sweet scented. Bracts are ovate-oblong, co 2 mm long, equalling the flower-stalks, falling off. Sepal-cup cup shaped, finely fringed with hairs. Petals are usually 5, rarely 6, more or less fused, linear, cleft, 7-9 mm long, stamens 3, staminodes 2-cleft at tip. Ovary is ovoid, hairless; style linear, half as long as the petals; stigma 3-lobed. Drupes are spherical, yellow, enclosed by accrescent sepal-cup. except at tip, apiculate. Parrot Olax is found in India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh to Peninsula Malaysia, Jawa to Lesser Sunda Islands.
Medicinal uses: In Ayurvedic medicine, the bark is used in anaemia and as a supporting drug in diabetes; also in the treatment of fever.

Identification credit: Shrikant Ingalhalikar Photographed in Karnataka, Maharashtra & Tamil Nadu.

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