Flowering and fruiting period: February – September

Distribution: Indo-Malaysia

Habitat: Dry deciduous forests, also widely planted

Uses: Fruits edible, Ayurvedic, firewood, drought tolerant, young leaves edible, antihelminthic. Avery bitter flavour, they are often eaten as a pre-meal appetizer. Among its many benefits, the one that is most unusual and immediately practical is the control of farm and household pests. Some entomologists now conclude that neem has such remarkable powers for controlling insects that it will usher in a new era in safe, natural pesticides

Key Characters: Neem, an evergreen tree with bark greyish-brown having verticale striations. Leaves imparipinnate, alternate, rachis slender and swollen at base. Leaflets are opposite; with lanceolate or falcate lamina, and serrated margin. Flowers are bisexual, white, in axillary panicles; sepals 5, ovate, margin ciliate; petals 5, free, white, oblong-obovate, pubescent, and imbricate. Staminal tube glabrous; anthers 10; ovary superior, style slender, stigma terete, 3-lobed. Fruit is a drupe.