Dilip Walse Patil

Scientific Name : Butea monosperma (Lam.) Kuntze

Category : Angiosperms

Status : Alive

Habit : An erect deciduous tree with young parts hairy. Bark : Light brown or greyish. Leaves : Tri-foliate, leaflets coriaceous, roundish-ovate, leathery in texture. Flowers : In big racemes, orange-red, bracts and bracteoles small, calyx campanulate, silky hairy outside, velvety inside, petals equal, silky hairy, keel semicircular, beaked.Stamens 10, diadelphous. Ovary stalked, style incurved. Fruit : Pods thin, downy bright 1-2 seeded. Flowering and Fruiting Time : February-March Significance : Used for road-side plantation. Leaves serve as plates for domestic purposes. Flowers yield a yellow dye and hence are also used in the festival of Holi. A gum exudates from the tree and is used in medicine as powerful astringent that is given in diarrhea and dysentery. Seeds are antihelmintic.