Pluchea lanceolata

Plant profile

Pluchea lanceolata

Morphological Characteristics

• It is a perennial herb, occurring in Indo-Gangetic plains, 30-60 cm tall.
• Stem and branches are terete, slender and softly pubescent.
• Leaves are 2-6 cm in length, sessile, oblanceolate or oblong, coriaceous, finely silky and pubescent on both surfaces, margins entire or obscurely dentate near the apex.

Floral Characteristics

• Flowers arewhite or purple, yellowor lilac in many headed compound corymbs.
• Capitulum is ovoid or campanulate, 6-7 mm in compound pubescent and corymbs.
• Involucre is ovoid or broadly campanulate of imbricated scales; outer involucral-scale is 2.5-4.0 mm long, 2 mm broad, 5-3 serrate, obtuse, silky pubescent, tinged with purple outside apex.
• The innermost scales are few, linear, scarious, subacute, slightly narrower and longer than the outer; all rigid when dry and tip of outer ones often breaking into 1-2 shallow lobes.
• Receptacle is flat and naked.

Distribution

• Plant is found in Punjab, upper Gangetic plains, Rajasthan and Gujarat.

Climate and Soil

• Plant grows in open waste lands over sandy-saline lands in low rainfall areas.

Propagation Material

• Seeds

Agro-technique

• Seeds can be directly sown in field.

• Raising Propagules: Seedlings of crop could be produced through planting of transition zone cuttings of the plant in the main field during September-March.

Planting in the Field

• Land Preparation and Fertilizer Application: The field is ploughed and harrowed well, to make a fine tilth. The crop responds well to the basal application of nitrogenous fertilizer.
• Sowing of Seeds and Optimum Spacing: Fresh seeds collected during October-March are directly sown in rows in the field. The spacing of 90 cm plant to plant and 120 cm row to row, gives optimum crop stand of 5000 plants/ha.
• Inter cropping System: No information available.
• Irrigation Practices: Rainfed crop, irrigated when required.
• Weed Control: Two manual weedings are required at an interval of one month each after the crop is 40 days old.
• Disease and Pest Control: No disease and pests have been noticed in trial plots.

Harvest Management

• Crop Maturity and Harvesting: The crop is manually harvested at flowering stage when chemical contents are maximum.
• Post-harvest Management: The harvested crop is shade dried and stored in gunny bags in air-cooled rooms for marketing.
• Chemical Constituents: Plant contains choline, pluchine taraxsterol, β- and g -sitosterol, leaves give quercetin and iso-rhamnctin.
• Yield : An average crop produces 40 t/ha of dry herb.

Therapeutic Uses

• Whole plant is used in Ayurvedic medicine.
• Pluchea lanceolata is accepted as classical drug for arthritis.
• Its decoction is given for rheumatic conditions, muscular pains, edema, and fever and also applied externally as massage oil.
• The leaves are aperients, used as a laxative, analgesic and antipyretic.