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Carissa carandas
Also called Bengal Currants, Carandas Plum
Karanda (Carissa carandas) is a spiny, drought-tolerant shrub or small tree from South Asia that produces small, sweet or sour black berries used in pickles and spices. It is hardy and adapts to a wide range of soils, so it suits dry, hot gardens.
Carissa carandas is a species of flowering shrub in the family Apocynaceae. It produces berry-sized fruits that are commonly used as a condiment in Indian pickles and spices. The fruit is black and tastes sweet or sour depending on the plant. It is a hardy, drought-tolerant plant that thrives well in a wide range of soils. Common names in English include Bengal currant, Carandas plum and karanda.
The supposed varieties congesta and paucinervia refer to the related conkerberry (C. spinarum).
The plant is grown from seed sown in August and September. The first monsoon shower is planting time. Plants raised from seed start bearing two years after planting. Vegetative propagation is practiced in the form of budding and inarching. Cuttings may also succeed. Flowering starts in March and in Northern India the fruit ripens from July to September.
Isolation of many terpenoids has been reported. In particular mixture of sesquiterpenes namely carissone and carindone as a novel type of C31 terpenoid have been reported. Another ingredient is pentacyclic triterpenoid carissin.
The plant flourishes in regions with high temperatures, and it is abundant in the Western Ghats of the Konkan region in India, particularly in the states of Maharashtra, Goa, Karnataka and also in some regions of Andhra Pradesh. It is also grown in the temperate conditions of the Himalayan Siwalik Hills of India and Nepal at elevations of 30 to 1,800 metres (98 to 5,906 ft). In other parts of India, it is grown on a limited scale in Rajasthan, Odisha, Gujarat, Bihar, West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh. It is also found in other South Asian countries like in the lowland rain forests of Sri Lanka, and in Pakistan, Nepal, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh. It is an introduced species in the Americas and other parts of Asia.
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Carissa carandas by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
