Strobilanthes alternata

Strobilanthes alternata (Burm.f.) E.

Family     : Acanthaceae 

Common Name  : മുറികൂട്ടി (Mal)

                                 Red Flame Ivy(Eng) 

It is a prostrate plant with attractive purple colored leaves. Leaves are opposite, ovate, 4.5-8 cm wide, with a somewhat blunt tip and rounded and heart shaped base with toothed margins. Flowers are white, found in terminal spikes up to 7 cm long. Flowers are tubular, cylindrical below, Swollen above, 1.0-1.5 cm long and 5 lobed.

Low creeping herbs, stem purple, rooting at nodes. Leaves opposite, 3-7 x 2-3.5 cm, broadly elliptic to elliptic ovate, acute at apex, base subcordate, margins crenate, glabrous, greenish-purple above, purple below, puckered into ridges between side-veins; lateral nerves 4 or 5 pairs; petiole 05-1 cm long. Spikes terminal, to 3 cm long; bracts leaf-like, purple, to 1.5 cm long, ciliate along the margins. Calyx purple, lobes to 1cm long, ciliate along margin. Corolla funnel shaped, white, throat with purple stripes; lobes 5, ca1 cm x 1cm,