Plumbago zeylanica

Plumbago zeylanica L., Sp. Pl. ed.1: 151. 1753; Boiss., Fl. Or. 4: 875; 1879; Clarke in Hook. f., Fl. Brit. India 3: 480. 1882; Collett, Fl. Siml. ed. 2: 296. 1921 (Reprint 1983); Sharma & Kachroo , Fl. Jammu (Illustr.) 2: t. 157. 1983; Dhaliwal & Sharma, Fl. Kullu Dist. 420. 1999; Kaur & Sharma, Fl. Sirmaur 406. 2004; Singh & Sharma, Fl. Chamba Dist. 445. 2006; Parker, For. Fl. Punj. ed. 1: 300. 1918 (Reprint 1973); Fl. China @ eFloras.org 15: 191; Fl. North Amer. @ eFloras.org; Fl. Pak. @ eFloras.org

Evergreen perennial shrub with long rambling herbaceous branches, 1-2 m tall; branches striate, twigs glandular. Leaves cauline, alternate; petiole 1-2 cm long with a dilated amplexicaul base, glabrous or puberulous; leaf blade 3-8 cm x 2-4.5 cm, ovate, margin entire, apex subacute, glabrous, thin, glaucescent beneath, base abruptly narrowed into the petiole up to 1.5 cm long, margined in upper half, amplexicaul at the base and there often dilated into stipule-like auricles. Inflorescence axillary or terminal, pedunculate spicate-raceme, up to 15 cm long with up to 30 flowers, peduncle and rachis glandular, viscid. Bracts 4-6 mm x 2-3 mm, ovate, acute to acuminate, glandular or not. Flowers sessile or shortly pedicellate, ca. 1 mm long, ca. 2.5 cm long and 1.5 cm across, bisexual, actinomorphic, hypogynous, pentamerous, white. Calyx 1-1.2 cm long, tubular with 5 greenish ribs entirely studded with large stalked capitate glands, membranous between ribs; limb not expanded, teeth 5, short. Corolla gamopetalous, salverform; tube slender, about twice as long as calyx, 2-2.5 cm long; limb 1.4-1.5 cm across, white, lobes 5, spreading, obovate-oblong, apex round or truncate, mucronate. Stamens 5, adnate with petals at base, included or slightly exserted, filaments dilated at base; anthers linear-oblong, purple, scarcely exserted, dorsifixed, longitudinal dehiscence. Ovary superior, ellipsoid, 5-angular, unilocular with solitary basal ovule; ovary attenuated into ca. 2 cm long style with apically 5 stigmatose branches.

Fruit a capsule, 7.5-8 mm, circumsciss near the base and splitting upwards into 5 valves, oblong, pointed, as long as persistent calyx. (Fruits not observed)

Flowering and Fruiting: Almost throughout the year
Common Names: Plumbago, White Leadwort; Chitrak (Hindi)