Acacia catechu (L.f.) Willd.

Acacia catechu (L.f.) Willd.

Know our Plant

Systematic classification:

Division   : Angiospermae 
Class      : Dicotyledons
Subclass   : Polypetalae
Series     : Calyciflora
Order      : Fabales
Family     : Fabaceae 
Genus      : Acacia 
Species    : catechu

Common Name:

Black cutch, karungali, kamugu, paku,baga.

General Information :

Acacia, commonly known as the wattles or acacias, is a large genus of shrubs and trees in the subfamily Mimosoideae of the pea family Fabaceae. It comprises a group of plant genera native to Africa and Australasia. The genus name is New Latin from the Greek word for ‘thorn’ from the habit of many species originally included in the genus.
Deciduous, gregarious trees, to 15 m high; bark dark greyish-brown to dark brown, rough, about 1.3 cm thick, exfoliating in long, narrow rectangular strips; blaze brownish-red; branchlets brown, glabrous. Leaves bipinnate, alternate, stipulate; stipular spines slightly infra axillary, paired, 3-10 mm long, straight or hooked, occasionally lacking on flowering branchlets; rachis 8-19.5 cm, slender, pulvinate, downy, grooved above, with a gland near the base of the rachis on the upper side; pinnae 10-20 pairs, 3.6-8 cm long, opposite, downy, slender, with a gland in between the terminal 6 pairs on the lower side, leaflets 30-50, opposite, paripinnate, sessile, stipels absent; lamina 2.5-8 x 0.5-1.5 mm, linear-oblong, base unequally truncate, apex round, obtuse, or mucronate, margin entire, pubescent, chartaceous; midrib subcentral at base, lateral nerves obscure. Flowers pale yellow, sessile, in long solitary or in groups of 2-4 axillary spikes; bracts cauducous; calyx cupular-campanulate, 1-1.5 x 1.3-1.5 mm, teeth triangular or deltoid; corolla 2.5-3 mm long, lobes oblong, ovate to linear-lanceolate; stamens many, 4.5-5 mm long; ovary stipitate, 0.8-1.2 mm long, oblong-ellipsoid; style 4-5 mm long; stigma terminal. Fruit a pod 5-10 x 1-1.6 cm, flat, straight, unlobed or sinuate along margins, thin walled, beaked at apex, brown, narrowed at base into a stipe, dehiscent; seeds 3-10, orbicular or ovate, flattened.


Economic importance

  • It posess antifungal, antiviral, antibacterial, antiinflammatory and antioxidant activity.
  • The tree’s seeds are a good source of protein Kattha, an extract of its heartwood, is used as an ingredient to give red color and typical flavor to paan.
  • The heartwood, bark, and wood extract (called catechu) are used in traditional medicine.
  • The bark is said to be effective against dysentery, diarrhoea and in healing of wounds. The seeds have been reported to have an antibacterial action.