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Tube Lousewort
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Tube Lousewort
ative Photo: Thingnam Girija
Common name: Tube Lousewort • Nepali: पोन्की Ponkee
Botanical name: Pedicularis siphonantha     Family: Orobanchaceae (Broomrape family)

The botanical name siphonantha arises from siphon - tube, and anthus - flower. It probably refers to the abnormally long and narrow flower-tube and/or the upper petal which is strongly twisted into a tube. Tube Lousewort is a herb, 8-10 cm high, found in the Himalayas. Stems single and ± erect, or sometimes numerous and outer stems procumbent, striate, glabrescent. Leaves basal and on stem. Flowers axillary, dense; bracts leaflike, glabrescent or long ciliate. Flowers rose-red; tube 4-7 cm, finely pubescent; upper lip strongly twisted apically, with or without a conspicuously auriculate protrusion; beak semicircular or slightly S-shaped, to 1.1 cm, slender; lower lip 1.1--1.5 X 1.5--1.8 cm, lobes emarginate or shallowly 2-lobed. Found in alpine meadows and swampy places, at altitudes of 3000-4600 m. Flowering: June-August.

Identification credit: Tabish Photographed in Yumthang Valley, Sikkim.

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