Hydrilla verticillata

• Botanical Name : Hydrilla verticillata (L.f.) Royle
• Common Name : Hydrilla, Baam
• Plant Family : Hydrocharitaceae
• Plant Form : Herb
• Occurrence (Sectors) : 15
• Occurrence (Special Areas) : Indroda Park

About Hydrilla verticillata Plant :

• Habit : A submerged leafy fresh-water herb forming large masses' stem slender with fibrous roots, internodes long or short, rooting at nodes.
• Leaves : Sessile, 4-8 in a whorl, linear, acute, entire.
• Flowers :
  • Minute, dioecious, males shortly pedicellate, solitary in subglobose spathe, females sessile, 1-2 in a tubular 2-toothed spathe.
  • Sepals 3, ovate, petals 3 oblong, stamens 3, anthers large, reniform.
  • Ovary produced beyond the spathe into a filiform beak, 1-celled, styles 2-3, linear, stigmas fimbriate.
• Fruit : Smooth
• Flowering and Fruiting Time : December
• Significance : Generally grown in tanks and ponds.