Pedalium murex L.

Gebel Elba.

Southeast Egypt, tropical east Africa, Ethiopia, Somalia, Socotra, Arabia, Mozambique, Madagascar, India, Sri Lanka.

Leaves and branches, when briskly stirred in cold water yield a thick mucilage similar to the white of a raw egg. Leaves and fruits are reported to possess medicinal properties, Leaves are also cooked as vegetable (Bruce, l.c.).

A diffuse annual, much branched, spreading, succulent, glandular, up to 60 cm tall. Roots similar to turmeric in colour. Leaves simple, opposite, ovate or oblong-obovate, 1-4.5 cm long, 0.5-3 cm broad, truncate or obtuse, irregularly and coarsely crenate-serrate, glabrous above, minutely scaly below, petiole-l-4 cm. Flowers 1.5-2 cm across; pedicel 1-2 mm long, increasing up to 4 mm in fruit. Calyx c.2 mm long; teeth linear, scaly outside, persistent. Petals connate into a broad tube, 1-3 cm long; lobes obtuse. Stamens included, 0.5-1 cm long; filaments dilated, glandular hairy at the base; anthers kidney shaped. Fruit indehiscent, abruptly narrowed at the base and with a patent spreading spine at each basal corner of the broader part, 1-1.8 cm long, 0.5-1 cm broad, spine 2-4 mm long. Seeds 2 or 1 per locule, oblong.

Distribution: W. Pakistan (Sind); India, (Kathiawar, Gujrat, Delhi, Bombay); Ceylon; Tropical Africa.

Fl. Per. March-December.

Coastal areas on saline soils, sometimes as a weed.

Widespread in tropical East Africa and West Africa, Socotra, Madagascar, Comores, India, Sri Lanka and Java.