Clerodendrum indicum (L.) Kuntze

A favourite ornamental of our gardens. Root is used in chest troubles, and the juice of the leaves mixed with butter fat is applied to cure herpetic eruptions etc. A resin obtained from the plant is used for checking syphilitic rheumatism.

Medicinal, ornamental.

Shrub, 1.5-3 m tall, laxly branched. Leaves verticillate, sessile, 3-5 in each whorl, narrowly lanceolate, 10-20 cm long, 1-2.5 cm broad, entire, acute. Cymes verticillately arranged to form a terminal, 20-25 cm long panicle. Flowers white, c. 1.5 cm across; bracts 5-10 mm long, reddish when young, linear to linear-lanceolate; pedicels up to 1.5 cm long. Calyx-lobes 6-7 mm long, ovate-lanceolate. Corolla-tube 8-10 mm long, glabrous; lobes ovate-oblong, 10-12 mm long, obtuse. Drupe c. 1 cm in diameter, bluish-black, enclosed by enlarged red coloured calyx.

Subshrubs to shrubs 1-2 m tall. Branchlets purple to purplish, channeled, smooth. Leaves whorled with 3-5 per node or opposite, sessile or subsessile, with nodal hairs at petiole base; leaf blade narrowly lanceolate to oblong-lanceolate, 10-21 X 1.3-2.5 cm, membranous, glabrous, base attenuate, margin entire or sinuate, apex short acuminate; midvein prominent, veins 10-12 pairs. Inflorescences terminal leafy thyrses, 20-45 X 10-15 cm; cymes red, few flowered; peduncle to 3 cm; bracts linear-lanceolate to lanceolate, 1-2 cm; bractlets awl-shaped. Calyx 1-1.5 cm, divided 3/4 to base, densely minute round glandular; lobes ovate-lanceolate, 8-15 X 3-6 mm, apex acute. Corolla white, becoming cream colored; tube funnelform, curved, 5-9 cm; lobes spreading, lanceolate, elliptic, or ovate-oblong, 8-15 3-6 mm, apex obtuse. Stamens long exserted. Ovary glabrous. Style longer than stamens. Fruiting calyx crimson, to 3.8 cm in diam., leathery. Drupes dark blue, ca. 1.2 cm in diam., 2-4-lobed depending on number of pyrenes. Fl. and fr. Aug-Nov.

Himalaya (Nepal to Bhutan), India, Ceylon, Burma, S. China, Indo-China, Malaya.

Distribution: India, Burma, Malaysia, Indochina and Java.

Guangdong, Yunnan [Bhutan, Cambodia, India, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Thailand]

200-1400 m

Fl. Per.: July-October.

Roadsides on mountain slopes; 500-1000 m.

Siphonanthus indica Linnaeus, Sp. Pl. 1: 109. 1753; Clerodendrum siphonanthus R. Brown.