What are the six parts of a garden balsam flower?
Garden balsam (Impatiens balsamina) is an annual herbaceous flower of the genus Impatiens in the family Balsaminaceae, order Sapindales. The whole plant is divided into six parts: root, stem, leaf, flower, fruit and seed. Because its flower head, wings, tail and feet all curve upward like a phoenix, it is also known as the golden phoenix flower. Let's take a look at these six parts of the garden balsam below!
Root
The garden balsam has a taproot system, whose main feature is that the primary root is noticeably thicker and longer than the lateral roots. Lateral roots grow from the primary root, with a clear distinction between primary and secondary roots, and the stem bears numerous fibrous roots.
Stem
The stem of the garden balsam is stout, fleshy, upright, unbranched or branched, hairless or sparsely pubescent when young, with a base diameter of up to 8 mm, and the lower nodes are often swollen.
Leaf
The leaves of the garden balsam are alternate, sometimes opposite on the lowest part of the plant. The leaf blade is lanceolate, narrowly elliptic or oblanceolate, 4-12 cm long and 1.5-3 cm wide, with a pointed or gradually pointed tip and a wedge-shaped base. The margin has sharp serrations, and toward the base there are often several pairs of stalkless black glands. Both surfaces are hairless or sparsely pubescent, with 4-7 pairs of lateral veins. The petiole is 1-3 cm long, with a shallow groove on the upper side and several pairs of stalked glands on both sides.
Flower
The flowers of the garden balsam are solitary or in clusters of 2-3 in the leaf axils, without a common peduncle, white, pink or purple, single or double. The pedicel is 2-2.5 cm long and densely pubescent. The bracts are linear and located at the base of the pedicel. There are 2 lateral sepals, ovate or ovate-lanceolate, 2-3 mm long. The lip is deeply boat-shaped, 13-19 mm long and 4-8 mm wide, pubescent, with its base abruptly tapering into an inward-curving spur 1-2.5 cm long. The standard petal is round, hooded, with a slightly concave tip, a narrow keel-like ridge on the midrib of the back, and a small point at the apex. The wing petals have short stalks, are 23-35 mm long, and are 2-lobed; the lower lobe is small and obovate-oblong, while the upper lobe is nearly round with a 2-lobed tip and a small ear near the base of the outer margin. There are 5 stamens, with linear filaments and ovoid anthers with blunt tips. The ovary is spindle-shaped and densely pubescent. The flowering period is July to October.
Fruit
The capsule of the garden balsam is broadly spindle-shaped, splitting at a touch when ripe, 10-20 mm long, pointed at both ends, and densely pubescent.
Seed
The garden balsam has numerous seeds, round-spherical, 1.5-3 mm in diameter, dark brown. When mature, the outer shell bursts open on its own, ejecting the seeds, and it reproduces by self-sowing, so seeds must be collected in time.