Volume 6 > Part 3 > Year 1997 > Page 195 > Linaceae > Reinwardtia

Reinwardtia indica Dumort.wfo-0001242741

Comm. Bot. 19. 1822; Press in Hara & Williams, En. Fl. Pl. Nepal 2: 73. 1979. Plate XVI: 2.

Accepted Name : This is currently accepted.

Synonyms & Citations :

Description : Erect or prostrate shrub up to 1 m, usually lower; branches terete. Leaves glabrous, petiole 5–10 mm long; lamina obovate or lanceolate, base tapering towards the petiole, apex rounded or acute, sometimes mucronate, 2–7 by 1–3 cm. Flowers axillary or terminal, solitary or clustered, in few-flowered cymes. Sepals narrowly lanceolate, acute, 10–15 mm. Petals clawed, broadly obovate, 15–30 mm long. Ovary glabrous, 4–5-loculate, styles 3–5, glabrous, as long as ovary. Capsule ovoid, surrounded by the persistent calyx and shorter than this.

Thailand : NORTHERN: Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai, Lampang.

Distribution : Himalaya: N India (type), Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, S China.

Ecology : Open, often disturbed vegetation near villages, also in open pine forests and in clearings in mountain evergreen forests, from 600–1,500 m alt.

Vernacular : Kham pa (คำป่า)(Northern).

Uses: In Malaysia and Indonesia (Java) grown as an ornamental and occasionally found as a garden escape.

Notes: This species and Reinwardtia cicanoba are not clearly separable as also pointed out by Press, I.c., as well as by earlier authors; intermediate forms occur in Himalaya. Reinwardtia cicanoba is, as far as known distributed from Nepal, Sikkim and Bhutan to W China. There are few collections of Reinwardtia from Thailand, they all belong to R. indica, but a closer study of the populations in northern Thailand is much needed.