''Capparis decidua'', commonly known as karira, is a useful plant in its marginal habitat.

Description

It is a small much-branched

tree In botany, a tree is a perennial plant with an elongated stem, or trunk, usually supporting branches and leaves. In some usages, the definition of a tree may be narrower, e.g., including only woody plants with secondary growth, only ...

shrub A shrub or bush is a small to medium-sized perennial woody plant. Unlike herbaceous plants, shrubs have persistent woody stems above the ground. Shrubs can be either deciduous or evergreen. They are distinguished from trees by their multiple ...

. It bears a mass of slender, gray-green leafless branches, the small

caducous Dehiscence is the splitting of a mature plant structure along a built-in line of weakness to release its contents. This is common among fruits, anthers and sporangia. Sometimes this involves the complete detachment of a part. Structures that op ...

leaves being found only on young shoots. It rarely exceeds a height of .Burdak, L.R. (1982). Recent Advances in Desert Afforestation- Dissertation submitted to Shri R.N. Kaul, Director, Forestry Research, F.R.I., Dehra Dun. p. 55 The new flush of leaves appears in November–January. Red conspicuous flowers appear in March to April and August–September and ripe by May and October. The pink fleshy

berries A berry is a small, pulpy, and often edible fruit. Typically, berries are juicy, rounded, brightly colored, sweet, sour or tart, and do not have a stone fruit, stone or pit (fruit), pit although many wikt:pip#Etymology 2, pips or seeds may be p ...

are readily eaten by birds. It coppices well and produces

root In vascular plants, the roots are the plant organ, organs of a plant that are modified to provide anchorage for the plant and take in water and nutrients into the plant body, which allows plants to grow taller and faster. They are most often bel ...

suckers freely. It is extremely drought-resistant and tolerates some frost.

Distribution and habitat

It can be found in arid regions in

North Africa North Africa (sometimes Northern Africa) is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region. However, it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of t ...

, the

Middle East The Middle East (term originally coined in English language) is a geopolitical region encompassing the Arabian Peninsula, the Levant, Turkey, Egypt, Iran, and Iraq. The term came into widespread usage by the United Kingdom and western Eur ...

, and

South Asia South Asia is the southern Subregion#Asia, subregion of Asia that is defined in both geographical and Ethnicity, ethnic-Culture, cultural terms. South Asia, with a population of 2.04 billion, contains a quarter (25%) of the world's populatio ...

, including the Thar desert. Khair city in Uttar Pradesh, India is famous for Kair trees.

Uses

The fruit and young buds can be eaten raw. Its spicy fruits are used for preparing

vegetable Vegetables are edible parts of plants that are consumed by humans or other animals as food. This original meaning is still commonly used, and is applied to plants collectively to refer to all edible plant matter, including edible flower, flo ...

s, curry and fine pickles and can attract helpful

insectivore file:Common brown robberfly with prey.jpg, A Asilidae, robber fly eating a hoverfly An insectivore is a carnivore, carnivorous animal or plant which eats insects. An alternative term is entomophage, which can also refer to the Entomophagy ...

s; the plant also is used in

folk medicine Traditional medicine (also known as indigenous medicine or folk medicine) refers to the knowledge, skills, and practices rooted in the cultural beliefs of various societies, especially Indigenous groups, used for maintaining health and treatin ...

and

herbalism Herbal medicine (also called herbalism, phytomedicine or phytotherapy) is the study of pharmacognosy and the use of medicinal plants, which are a basis of traditional medicine. Scientific evidence for the effectiveness of many herbal treatments ...

. It can be used in landscape gardening, afforestation and reforestation in semidesert and desert areas; it provides assistance against

soil erosion Soil erosion is the denudation or wearing away of the Topsoil, upper layer of soil. It is a form of soil degradation. This natural process is caused by the dynamic activity of erosive agents, that is, water, ice (glaciers), snow, Atmosphere of Ea ...

.Kaul (1963), Ghosh (1977)

References

Sources

* (1963): Need for afforestation in the arid zones of Khair, India. ''LA-YAARAN'' 13. * (1977): ''Handbook on afforestation techniques''. Khair, India. * (1975): ''Environmental analysis of the Thar Desert''. Dehra Dun.

External links

{{Taxonbar, from=Q3242136 decidua Desert fruits Trees of Africa Flora of the Indian subcontinent Garden plants of Asia Garden plants of Africa Drought-tolerant trees Ornamental trees Flora of the Thar Desert Taxa named by Peter Forsskål