• Family : BIXACEAE
• Family (As per The Plant List) : Bixaceae
• Species : Cochlospermum religiosum
• Species Name (as per The Plant List) : Cochlospermum religiosum (L.) Alston
• Common name : Yellow Silk Cotton Tree, Golden Silk Cotton Tree, Buttercup Tree
• Vernacular name : Girisalmalika, Silakarpasika (San.); Pilikapaas, Gajarakumbi (Hin.); Arishina boorage (Kan.)
• Collection Nos : CJS 16062, CJS 16607
• Key identification features : A small deciduous tree. Leaves are large and palmately lobed. Flowers which appear after leaf fall are large (6-8 cm across), in terminal branched inflorescence, golden-yellow in colour. Fruit is large and pear-shaped. Seeds are numerous and covered with woolly hairs. Bark is smooth, ash-coloured, fibrous, furrowed and contains gum.
• Habit : Tree
• Native : Tropical Asia
• Comments : A sacred tree ; yields an insoluble gum, karaya which is a substitute for tragacantha and used in book binding, ,thickening Ice cream. Because of the gum branches throw a clear bright flame they are used as torches by villages.
• Conservation Status : Not Evaluated (NE)
• Distribution Locality : Bangalore, Belgaum, Bellary, Bijapur, Chitradurga, Dakshina Kannada, Davanagere, Gulbarga, Hassan, Kodagu, Kolar, Mysore, Tumkur, Uttara Kannada
• Floras referred : Saldanha & Nicolson, 1976 - Hassan; Ramaswamy & Razi, 1973 - Bangalore; Rao & Razi, 1981 - Mysore; N.P.Singh, 1988- Flora of Eastern Karnataka; Manjunath et al., 2003 - Davanagere

Description

Field Images