Briedelia retusa (L.) A. Juss.
മുള്ളുവേങ്ങ
| Family: | EUPHORBIACEAE |
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| Sub-Family: | Not available | ||||
| English Name: | Spinous Kino Tree | ||||
| Synonym: | Clutia retusa L. | ||||
| Common Name: | Asuvamaram, Kaini, Kadukumaram, Komanji, Mukkayini | ||||
| Flowering & Fruiting Period: | August - December | ||||
| Distribution: | Indo-Malaya | ||||
| Habitat: | Semi-evergreen and deciduous forests, also in the plains | ||||
| Uses: | Ayurvedic, drought tolerant. The plant is pungent, bitter, heating, useful in lumbago, hemiplegia; bark is good for the removal of urinary concretions (Ayurveda). Root and bark are valuable astringents. The bark is used as a liniment with gingelly oil in rheumatism. The ripe fruit is edible. | ||||
| Key Characteristics: | Briedelia retusa are deciduous trees bark greyish-brown; young trees armed with sharp thorns. Leaves simple, alternate, broadly elliptic, oblong, base round, margin entire, bright green and glabrous. Flowers unisexual; greenish-yellow, sessile, crowded in dense axillary or terminal. Male flowers: tepals 10, biseriate, valvate; stamens 5, monadelphous, anthers oblong; pistillode bifurcate; disc annular. Female flowers: tepals 10, biseriate, lanceolate, valvate; ovary half inferior, globose, 2-locular, ovules 2 in each cell; styles 2. Fruit a drupe, purplish-black. | ||||