Nymphoides indica

Aquatic herbs

Rhizomatous herbs; rhizome 2-3 cm thick with prominent branch scars. Primary fertile branches many, petiole-like and uniphyllous, highly variable in length depending on the depth of water; secondary branches sympodial, zig-zag, many-jointed, trailing on water surface; each joint uniphyllous; nodes often rooting. Leaves all cauline, fertile and floating, to about 25 cm across, ovate-orbicular, base deeply cordate with narrow sinuses, entire or subentire, fleshy, glossy green above, pale and gland-dotted beneath ; petiole to 3 cm long. Flowers bisexual, distylous in umbellate clusters from the junction of the petiole and the branch; bract to 7 x 4 mm, ovate or oblong; pedicel 5-10 cm long. Calyx deeply 5-partite; lobes to 6 x 2 mm, oblong-acute, green with hyaline margins. Corolla white with yellow throat; tube c. 2 mm long; lobes 5, to 13x4 mm, elliptic or oblong, acute, densely covered with long, white hairs within. Stamens as many as corolla lobes, dimorphic; filaments yellow. Ovary bottle- shaped; stigma sinuately 4-8 lobed; disc glands as many as stamens, orbicular. Capsules ellipsoid. Seeds c. 1.5 mm across, discoid, brownish, tubercled.