Common name: Feather-leaved cassia, fish-bone cassia, Japanese tea, Chichani (Marathi)
Botanical name: Chamaecrista mimosoides Family: Caesalpiniaceae (Gulmohar family)
Synonyms: Cassia mimosoides/sensitiva
An exceedingly variable, prostrate to erect legume up to 1.5 m high, usually
annual, sometimes with stems becoming woody above ground level.
Stems variable, usually puberulent with short curved
hairs, sometimes more or less densely clothed with longer spreading hairs.
Compound leaves are linear to linear-oblong, more or less parallel-sided,
0.6 to 10 cm long, 0.4 to 1.5 cm, with 16-76 pairs of oblong leaflets. This
makes the leaf appear like a fish-bone, which is the origin of its one of the
many common names.
Inflorescence one- to three-flowered. Flowers are yellow, five-petalled,
typical cassia form.
Petals yellow, obovate 4 to 13 mm long, 2 to 9 mm wide. Pods linear to
linear-oblong, (sometimes 1.5 but usually 3.5 to 8 cm long); 3.5 mm wide.
Feather-leaved cassia is probably native to Africa.
| Photographed in
Maharashtra. |
Identification credit: Pravin Kawale
|
aturalized