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Nymphaea nouchali
Also called Sada Shapla, Cape Blue Waterlily, Cape Water Lily, Day Waterlily, Red And Blue Waterlily
Blue lotus is a small, day-blooming tropical water lily with star-shaped blue, white or pink flowers, grown in ponds and water gardens. The key to growing it is a sunny spot with still or slow-moving water and a rhizome planted in soil at the bottom of the pond.
Nymphaea nouchali, often known by its synonym Nymphaea stellata, or by common names blue lotus, star lotus, red water lily, dwarf aquarium lily, blue water lily, blue star water lily or manel flower, is a water lily of genus Nymphaea. It is native to southern and eastern parts of Asia, and is the national flower of Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. This species is usually considered to include the blue Egyptian lotus N. nouchali var. caerulea. In the past, taxonomic confusion has occurred, with the name Nymphaea nouchali incorrectly applied to Nymphaea pubescens.
This aquatic plant is native in a broad region from Afghanistan, the Indian subcontinent, to Taiwan, southeast Asia and Australia. It has been long valued as a garden flower in Thailand and Myanmar to decorate ponds and gardens. In its natural state, N. nouchali is found in static or slow-flowing aquatic habitats of low to moderate depth.
White Water-lily · Dotleaf waterlily · Nymphaea nouchali var. zanzibariensis · Giant waterlily · Yellow waterlily · Egyptian lotus · American white waterlily · Hairy Water Lily · Pygmy Rwandan waterlily · Waterlily
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Nymphaea nouchali 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.
