SYMBIOSIS :171: Attaching an image of Common Tiger butterfly on the flower of Leucas. efloraindia: 091211 BRS 253: Pl. find the attached file contain photo for id. request.
Location: Anaikatti, Coimbatore
Date: )8.12.2011
Habitat: Wild
Habit: Herb
This is Western Hill Catmint [Anisomeles heyneana].
Anisomeles heyneana indeed Leucas procumbens, I suppose. It is Leucas for sure. Pl also check it for L. biflora. Can it be Leucas lanata? May be Leucas biflora Sorry for the wild guess but it prompted me to look into the details. From whatever I concluded from the info. available to me.
1) Leucas biflora (2 var….biflora and procumbens) will have lax whorls, which are 2-4 flowered. Here it is showing many more flowered. 2) Mouth of calyx tube doesn’t look to be oblique….which eliminates a large group. 3) Calyx teeth stellately spreading, mouth villous…….Well I think so. (The other group has Calyx teeth not stellately spreading, mouth not villous) 4)Next we have to look for upper lip of corolla a)densely bearded with rufous hairs; calyx teeth lanceolate …. L. ciliata a)densely bearded with white hairs; calyx teeth not lanceolate … b)Calyx tube pubescent or tomentose, glandular teeth linear …L.stelligera b)Calyx tube glabrous below, villous above the middle teeth subulate L.eriostema. Considering the above Key the illustrated plant appears to be L.stelligera.
Please comment and opine. L. stelligera Wall. Pl. As. Rar. 1: 61. 1831; Hook. f. Fl. Brit. India 4: 686. 1885; Cooke, Fl. Pres. Bombay 2: 553. 1958 (Repr.);
Herbs, up to 1 m high; stems and branches hairy with erect and spreading hairs, quadrangular. Leaves 4.8 x 1.8.2.5 cm, elliptic.lanceolate or narrowly lanceolate, softly hairy on both sides, apex subacute, base tapering, margins serrate. Flowers white, in dense, many.flowered, axillary and terminal heads; bracts up to 0.6 cm long, linear; calyx 0.5.0.8 cm long; corolla 0.8.1.2 cm long, tube annulate inside. Nutlets c 0.2 cm long, ovoid, smooth.
This is the desciption of Leucas steilligera from Flora of Maharashtra. In Mahabaleswhar and Kas region these plants are plenty. Main difference is: In L. stelligera the infl is many flowered where as here only two or so flowers are seen. I disagree to name a plant as Leucas stelligera.
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