CLIMBING FLAX (Kaarkkotti)
| Name in Malayalam | : | കാർക്കോട്ടി |
| Name in Hindi | : | क्लाइम्बिंग फ्लैक्स |
| Botanical Name | : | Hugonia mystax |
| Medicinal part | : | Leaf, Root , Stem, Fruit |
| Medicinal properties | : | The roots are astringent, bitter, sweet, febrifuge and anthelmintic |
Description
Climbing Flax (Hugonia mystax) is a species of plant in the family Linaceae found mainly in the dry forests of peninsular India and Sri Lanka. It is a scandent shrub, sometimes growing liana-like over other trees and bears yellow flowers and orange to red fruits in the rainy season. The branchlets are leafless at the base and instead have a pair of recurved spines which bear a resemblance to a moustache, giving rise to the epithet mystax, Latin for moustache.Characteristics:
Climbing Flax is a rambling, climbing scrub with yellow velvet-hairy twigs. Branchlets are horizontal, provided with a pair of strong circinate hooks. Leaves are simple, alternate, elliptic-obovate hairless and penninerved. Flowers are yellow, about 2.5 cm across, borne at the ends of the branchlets, on short stalks, clothed with soft yellow hairs. Petals are many times longer than the sepals. Fruits are globose fleshy drupes, seeds 2 or 3 compressed. Climbing Flax is found in Peninsular India and Sri Lanka. Hugonia mystax is a climbing shrub attaching itself to supports by means of tendrils. The plant is harvested from the wild for local medicinal use.Medicinal Uses:
The roots are astringent, bitter, sweet, febrifuge and anthelmintic. They are useful in fever, verminosis and vitiated conditions of vata, externally as a past for inflammations and used swelling due to viper bite. The root is powdered and used internally as a febrifuge and in the treatment of intestinal worms. Externally, it is used in reducing inflammatory swellings and as an antidote to snake bites.
