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Vanilla planifolia Andr

Synonyms	:	Vanilla planifolia var. macrantha Griseb.
Family	:	Orchidaceae-
Local Name	:	Malayalam-Vanila English -Vanila
Flowering and fruiting period	:	December-April
Distribution	:	Native of South East Mexico and Central America
Distribution in Kerala	:	All Districts
Habitat	:	Cultivated
Endemic/Exotic	:	Exotic
Uses	:	The bean is commonly used to make flavoring, but it is also used to make medicine. People take vanilla to treat intestinal gas and fever.
Key botanical characters:   Fleshy herbaceous perennial vine, climbing up trees to a height of 10-15 m by means of long, whitish adventitious roots, opposite the leaves; stem long, cylindrical, simply or branched, succulent, 1-2 cm in diameter, dark green. Leaves alternate fleshy, subsessile, oblong-elliptic to lanceolate, rounded at base, acute to acuminate at top, with numerous parallel veins. Inflorescence axillary racemes, 5-8 cm long, usually 6-15-flowered. Flowers opening from the base of the inflorescence upwards, ca. 8 cm in diameter, waxy, fragrant. Sepals 3, oblong, 4-7 cm x 1-1.5 cm. Two upper petals resembling the sepals but slightly smaller. Lip trumpet-shaped, 4-5 x 1.5-3 cm. Column 3-5 cm long, attached to labellum, bearing at its tip 2 pollinia covered by a cap; stigma concave, separated from the pollinia by a thin flaplike rostellum. Fruit a pendulous, narrowly cylindrical capsule, 10-25 cm x 0.8-1.5 cm, obscurely 3-angled, splitting longitudinally when ripe; seeds numerous, globose, about 0.4 mm in diameter, black.