Regions: West India

A coastal tree that fruits on poor laterite where almost nothing else does.

The kokum of the Konkan — a slim tree with fruit that makes the summer drink.

Kagzi lime — the single most useful pot tree for an Indian household.

Mosambi — a grafted tree in a big tub crops well in the west and centre.

The fruit of the dry west, cropping where irrigation is impossible.

A century-tree with feathery shade and the sourness of half of Indian cooking.

Feathery-leaved and drought-hardy; one grafted tree feeds a household in winter.

Yellow bells almost all year on a shrub that survives a forgotten terrace.

A spiny yellow-flowered shrub of dry scrub, unbothered by heat or thin soil.

The abolí of southern flower markets — orange fans, picked daily.