Trees & Plants

Marabou-thorn

Kudhu beli

Dichrostachys cinerea (L.)

A recent introduction to some of the Islands An ornamental plant with attractive pink and yellow flowers. The wood is used as round wood, posts, exterior fittings, fences, walking sticks, tool handles and spears. Non-wood uses are for getting gums, lac, dyestuffs, bark products,

Details

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uses: An ornamental plant with attractive pink and yellow flowers. The wood is used as round wood, posts, exterior fittings, fences, walking sticks, tool handles and spears. Non-wood uses are for getting gums, lac, dyestuffs, bark products, fibres, and honey. Debarked roots are used to make baskets and racks. Leaves and seeds are nutritious ets and used as a fodder for livestock. In traditional medicine, the bark, roots and leaves are used to treat headache, toothache, dysentery, elephantiasis, stings, snakebites, syphilis and gonorrhea. Th reat & damage: It is a fast growing species which can invade agricultural fields, wasteland, roadsides and disturbed areas. It poses a threat to agricultural production wherever invaded.
family: Fabaceae-Mimosoideae
synonym: Mimosa cinerea L., Acacia cinerea (L.) Spreng.
description: Small trees, armed with spines; spines axillary, straight, often leaf bearing; bark with vertical fissures, peeling offin thin flake; branchlets densely pubescent, spine-tipped. Leaves bipinnate, alternate, stipulate; rachis 30- 65 mm, slender, pulvinate, pubescent; pinnae 5-15 pairs, 1.5-2 cm, opposite, even pinnate, slender, pulvinate, pubescent, with a gland between each pairs; leaflets 24-50, opposite, sessile, estipellate; 0.2- × 0.3 0.1 cm, oblong, base obtuse, apex acute. Flowers polygamous, 2 mm across, in solitary or axillary paired spikes; upper flowers bisexual, yellow; lower ones neutar, pink or purple; bracts oblong. Calyx tube Th campanulate, lobes 5. Petals 5, lanceolate, connate below. Stamens 10, free, exserted, anthers ending in stalked glands. Ovary It 0.5 mm. Fruit a pod, linear, flat, coiled, Wight & Arn. continuous within, indehiscent or opening from apex; seeds 4-6, ovoid, compressed.
native range: Africa
distribution: Pantropical
english names: Marabou-thorn · Princess’s earrings · Sickle bush
flowering fruiting: October-January
occurrence maldives: A recent introduction to some of the Islands