Regions: south

Blue flower sprays and orange berries at once; the standard clipped Indian hedge.

Invasive across Indian forests — grow the sterile garden cultivars only, never the wild kind.

The chandni — pinwheel white flowers, glossy leaves and constant flowering in shade.

The palmarosa of the Deccan, distilled for a rose-scented oil.

Yellow culms striped green; the ornamental clumping bamboo of Indian gardens.

The deep red night-flowering lily of eastern tanks and temple ponds.

Grows on water or wet mud and crops every fortnight through the monsoon.

Narrow willow leaves and yellow bells; tough, fast and equally poisonous.

Orange tubular flowers, continuously, and the sunbirds that follow them.

The southern vasaka — a shade-tolerant shrub with white hooded flowers.