Growing spaces: terrace

Grown for the seed that swells in falooda and summer sherbets.

A creeping mat for the wet edge of a terrace pond or a bowl garden.

Singhara — a floating annual grown in ponds and tanks across the north and east.

A floating fern that fixes nitrogen — fertiliser and fodder that grows itself.

East Indian lemongrass, distilled in the north-east for citral oil.

A few canes in a corner give juice, gur and a green screen by October.

The ghost chilli of Nagaland — a genuine regional speciality, and ferocious.

Grown for fibre and calyces in the west and centre; a striking tall annual.

Desi cotton — the indigenous species, hardier than the imported kinds.

The dye plant of history, nitrogen-fixing and undemanding.