1471

Premna tomentosa Willd.

Synonym	:	Premna cordata Blanco
Family	:	Lamiaceae
Local name	:	English -Bastard Teak Malayalam-  Katutekku
Flowering and fruiting period	:	February-April
Distribution	:	Peninsular India and Sri Lanka
Distribution in Kerala	:	Palakkad, Idukki, Wayanad
Habitat	:	Dry deciduous forests
Uses	:	he dried entire plant is used as a poultice to soothe skin irritation caused by caterpillars. The bark has been used to treat diarrhoea. The light brown wood is smooth, close-grained and hard, It is used for house building, furniture, weaving shuttles, and also for carving, turnery and fancy work.
Key botanical characters:  Tree about 25-20 ft tall. Bark grayish brown, branches and branchlets obtusely quadrangular, young parts densely stellate-wooly with brownish hairs, slightly glabrous when mature, nodes annulate, flat, internodes 1-2 cm long. Leaves simple, decussate-opposite, lanceolate-elliptic, ovate-cordate, 5-22 × 3-14 cm, base truncate to obtuse, margin entire, apex acute to acuminate, chartaceous, membranous, pubescent above, densely pubescent beneath, lateral veins 5-7 on either side of the midrib, impressed above, prominent on beneath, reticulate veinlets, petiole slender, pubescent, canaliculated, about 5-12 cm long. Inflorescence terminal panicles, composed of 8–12 opposite dichotomously branched cymes, about 6-12 cm long, peduncle, slender, obtusely quadrangular, densely pubescent, about 2-4 cm long, bracts leaflike or foliaceous, lanceolate, apex caudate, about 4 mm long, bractlets linear. Flowers bisexual, numerous, pedicels about 2-4 mm long, Calyx campanulate, faintly 5 toothed, 2 lipped, lobes subequal, pubescent, about 3 × 3 mm across, Corolla infundibular, 4 lobed, obscurely 2 lipped, upper lip 1 lobed, retuse, lower lip 3 lobed, lobes obovate, apex acute, corolla tube narrow, about 3 x 1 mm across, densely pubescent at throat, pubescent outside. Stamens 4, didynamous, exserted, filaments filiform, about 2-3 mm long, slightly exserted, anthers globose, 2-celled, Ovary obovoid, truncate at apex, 1 × 1 mm, pubescent, style slender, 3-4 mm long, stigma faintly. Fruit drupaceous, obovoid, glabrous, about 2 x 3 mm across, green, dark purplish black when ripe, fruiting calyx saucer shaped.