Citrus medica L.

Shrub

Flowering: Year Round. Fruiting: Year Round (more during Spring)

Flowering: April-May. Fruiting: October-November.

Flowering & fruiting occur through out the year but more during spring

A small tree or shrub that reaches a height of 3-6 m. It has irregular straggling branches and stiff twigs and long spines at the leaf axils. The evergreen leaves are green and lemon scented with slightly serrate edges, ovate lanceolate, about 3 -7 inches long. Flowers are white, usually tinged with red. Fruit is usually oblong and obovoid narrowing towards the stylar end, yellow when ripe and highly aromatic. The rind is leathery, furrowed and adherent. The inner portion is thick, white and hard. The pulp is acidic, but also can be sweet. It is a large fruit which can reach to about 4 - 5 kg if not picked before fully mature

Evergreen shrub or small trees up to 4 m tall; branchlets angular and purplish when young, glabrous, stout; axillary spins ca. 4 cm long, straight. Leaves simple, alternate, spiral; petioles ca. 0.5-1 cm long, margined; lamina ca. 6-18 x 3-9 cm, oblanceolate or obovate, obtuse or rounded at base, acute or rounded at apex, crenate-serrate at margin with white gland-dotted; secondary nerves 8-12 pairs. Inflorescences in axillary racemes, few-flowered; Flowers ca. 1.5 cm, white or pinkish, oblong in bud, bisexual and staminate; calyx urceolate, 4 or 5-lobed; lobes ca. 4 mm long; petals 5, ca. 2-4 x 1 cm, pink or purplish abaxially, oblong or oblanceolate, glandular; stamens 30-40 or more; filaments polyadelphous, white, shortly pubescent; anthers ca. 5 mm long, yellowish, linear; ovary ca. 8 x 4 mm, 12-14-locular, cylindric; style ca. 15 mm long, purplish, cylindric; stigma pinkish, globose, sticky. Fruits ca. 10-20 x 6-14 cm, ovoid-oblong, ellipsoid or obovoid, yellowish, surface smooth, rough or warty on outer, obtuse or depressed at base, obtuse or mamillate at apex; rind very thick, strongly adherent, glandular, foveolate, aromatic; mesocarp whitish, hard; endocarp segments 10-12, with pale greenish acidic or sweetish pulp-vesicles. Seeds numerous, ca. 10 x 5 mm, acute at base, smooth, white when cut.

A bushy thorny shrub common along the edges of marshes, sluggish stream and river islands in the upstream. Leaves elliptic - obovate, oblong - lanceolate, aromatic. Spines straight. Flowers are white, usually tinged with red. Fruit oblong and obovoid, yellow when ripe and highly aromatic

Notes: Western Ghats & Eastern Ghats, Cultivated

Forest along marshes, sluggish streams

In open forests, road-sides, cultivated to naturalized; 300-800 m; frequent.

The fleshy mesocarp of the fruit is sweet, eaten fresh and also the acid juice of the fruit is taken. The candied peel is sun dried or pickled. It is widely used in food industry as an aromatic ingredient

Nutritional Value

Energy 29kcal; carbohydrate 9.32 gm; protein 1.1 gm; fat 0.3gm; dietry fibres 2.8 gm; riboflavin 0.02mg; thiamine 0.01 mg; vitamin C 53 mg; sodium 2.5mg; potassium 138mg; calcium 26 mg; iron 0.6 mg & magnesium 8 mg per 100 gms of the fruit plup

The thick rind of the fruit can be sliced and added to salads, or candied and used as flavouring in cakes, puddings, confectionery etc. Fruit has been used since Roman times as a perfume and moth repellent.

The fleshy mesocarp of the fruit is sweet, eaten fresh; also acid juice of the fruit is taken. It was a common scene during harvesting of paddy, Assamese ladies prefers to eat this acid fruit with salt and chilli

A common fruit associated with paddy harvesting in Assam. Local people especially women folks prefer to eat the acid fruit with salt and chilli during harvesting season. It is considered to be highly medicinal and is used for improving digestion, a remedy for motion sickness and pulmonary troubles etc. The peel is also used as a remedy for dysentery

The fresh shoots, leaves, flowers, fruits and seeds of the plant have all entered into a number of traditional medicinal preparations for the treatment of asthma, arthritis, headache, stomach-ache, intestinal parasites. The fruits are used in the treatment of malaria, coughs and colds. The stem is used in febrifuge pills. Decoctions of the roots are reportedly used to treat respiratory problems and backache in China.