FoI
Prickly Amaranth
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Prickly Amaranth
aturalized Photo: Dinesh Valke
Common name: Prickly Amaranth, Edlebur, Needle burr, Spiny amaranth, Thorny amaranth • Hindi: Kanta chaulai • Manipuri: ꯆꯦꯡꯀ꯭ꯔꯨꯛ চেংগ্ক্রুক Chengkruk • Marathi: कांटेभाजी kante bhaji, कांटेमाठ kante math • Tamil: முள்ளுக்கீரை mullukkeerai • Malayalam: Kattumullenkeera • Mizo: Lenhling • Tangkhul: Somchan • Telugu: ముళ్లతోటకూర mullatotakura • Kannada: ಮುಳ್ಳುಹಱುವೆ Mullu haruve, ಮುಳ್ಳುಹಱಿವೆ Mullu harive • Bengali: Kantanotya • Sanskrit: Tanduliuyah • Nepali: काँडे लुँडे Kaande Lunde, बन्दनी Bandanee, बन लुँडे Ban Lunde • Angami: Liza
Botanical name: Amaranthus spinosus    Family: Amaranthaceae (Amaranth family)

Prickly Amaranth is an annual herb with sometimes red tinged erect stems, sometimes ascending, 30-150 cm long, usually branched. Leaves ovate to rhombic-ovate, elliptic, lanceolate-oblong, or lanceolate, blades 1-12 cm long, 0.89-6 cm wide, smooth, leaft stalk 1-9 cm long. Flowers green, in axillary clusters in the lower part of the plant and in unbranched or branched spikes in the upper part, the lower clusters entirely without stamens as are the lower flowers of the spikes, the upper flowers in the spikes staminate. Prickly Amaranth is native to Tropical America, widely naturalized elsewhere. It is found in the Himalayas, and Western Ghats up to altitudes of 1200 m.

Identification credit: Dinesh Valke Photographed in Vaghbil, Thane, Maharashtra.

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