Common Name: Fever nut, Bonduc nut. Tamil Name: Kaccuram
Fever nut is a thorny shrub with climbing tendency. The plant has wide global distribution and is occasionally found around dry scrub jungle areas of the Western Ghats. The shrub is well armed- recurved hooks are found all over the plant. The leaves are arranged in an alternate manner and are bi-pinnate; leaflets margins are entire. The leaf has 5-7 pairs of pinnae; each pinnae has about 7 pairs of leaflets. The leaflets are shiny green, oval in shape with an unequal base and an acute tip. The entire leaf measure around 34 cm in length. Prickles are seen on rachis. The leaflet measure around 4.5 cm in length. The inflorescence is in the form of an axillary raceme. The flowers are yellow in color with a spot of red in the middle. The fruit is in the from of a pod with long prickles all over the surface. They are initially green in color, later turn brown on maturity. The pods contain two round seed which are grey in color. Bonduc nut is used in traditional systems of medicine to treat fever. Fever nut is the larval host plant for Opaque line-blue, Transparent line-blue, Chestnut-streaked sailer, Indian nawab and Three-spot grass yellow butterflies.
