Neelolpalam / Pickerel Weed
Monochoria vaginalis
- Habit
- Herb
- Found in India
- Karnataka, Kerala, Assam & more
- Flowering
- May-November
How to identify Neelolpalam
Identify Neelolpalam by combining habit, leaf characters, flower or fruit details, location, and its family pattern. Do not rely on one feature alone.
- Look for a herb habit.
- Check the distinctive field mark: Common paddy-field weed with blue flowers (pickerel weed).
- Confirm fruit type: Capsule.
- In season, compare flowering and fruiting time: May-November.
- In India, compare location records such as Karnataka, Kerala, Assam, Uttarakhand and nearby regions.
- Confirm it sits within the Pontederiaceae family pattern, then compare close relatives before deciding it is Neelolpalam.
Plant Details
- Scientific name
- Monochoria vaginalis
- Genus
- Monochoria
- Family
- Pontederiaceae
- Habit
- Herb
- Habitat
- Paddy fields and wet lowlands
- Habitat type
- Wetland
- Native to
- Tropical Asia, Australia
- Distribution
- India, Nepal, Bhutan, Malesia, Himalayas, China, Japan
- Found in India
- Karnataka, Kerala, Assam, Uttarakhand, Arunachal Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Jharkhand, Manipur, Meghalaya, West Bengal
- Flowering & fruiting
- May-November
- Conservation status
- Least Concern (LC)
Flower & fruit characters
- Fruit type
- CapsulerecordedA dry fruit from a fused ovary that splits open at maturity to release seeds.“The fruit is a capsule about a centimeter long which contains many tiny winged seeds.” — Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0
Characters marked “recorded” are for Neelolpalam itself; the rest are typical of the Pontederiaceae family — flowering plants only.
Local Names
- Bengali
- ছোটনখা | পানি কচু
- Malayalam
- കരിങ്കൂവളം, Neelolpalam, നീലോല്പലം
About Neelolpalam
A member of the Pontederiaceae family, Pickerel Weed (Monochoria vaginalis) is a herb. In India it has been recorded in Karnataka, Kerala, Assam and 8 other states. It grows in paddy fields and wet lowlands. Flowering and fruiting run from May to November.
Pontederiaceae
Pickerel-Weed Family
Neelolpalam belongs to the Pontederiaceae family.
The illustration represents the family — not necessarily this exact species.
Explore the Pontederiaceae familySnap it. Know it.
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Common plant problems
If you are starting from symptoms instead of a diagnosis, use the plant disease symptom checker to narrow the cause before treating.
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