| Monocotyledon | Literature for Zingiber zerumbet
Wagner et al., 1990, 1999; Lorence & Wagner, 2019. |
| Zingiberaceae -- The Ginger Family | Bibliography |
| Zingiber zerumbet | |
Common name(s): ginger, `awapuhi, `awapuhi kuahiwi, `opuhi, shampoo ginger, wild ginger |
| General Information | ||
|---|---|---|
| Distribution | Native range uncertain, perhaps India. Long cultivated in SE Asia and carried by humans throughout the Pacific region where it has become naturalized on many islands. In the Hawaiian Islands, a Polynesian introduction on Kaua`i, O`ahu, Moloka`i, Lana`i, Maui, Hawai`i. | |
| Habit |
Deciduous, seasonally dormant herb
with numerous leafy shoots 0.75‒2 m tall. |
|
| Leaves |
Leaves with petiole 4‒5 mm long, pubescent, ligule membranous, 1.5‒4 cm long, entire, pubescent or glabrate, sheath reddish, 3‒6.5 cm long, pubescent; blade lanceolate, 14‒40 cm long, 3‒8.5 cm wide, pubescent on adaxial surface along midrib and on abaxial surface. |
|
| Flowers |
Inflorescences with peduncle 9‒50 cm long; spikes variable, ovoid, obovoid, globose, ellipsoid, rhomboid, cylindrical, or somewhat fusiform, 3.5‒10.5 cm long, 1.75‒5.5 cm wide, bracts green when young, becoming pale and finally red, closely imbricate,
ovate, obovoid-rhomboid, or broadly elliptic, 1.5‒4 cm long, 1.25‒4 cm wide, glabrate to pubescent, margin membranous, apex not incurved. Flowers with calyx 13‒17 mm long; corolla whitish to pale to dark yellow, tube 2‒3 cm long, lobes 1.5‒2.5 cm long; labellum orange to yellow, ovate, orbicular, or suborbicular, 1.2‒2 cm long, 1.5‒2 cm wide, apex emarginate; anther pale yellow, 8‒10 mm long. |
|
| Fruit |
Fruit red, obovoid, ca. 12 mm long
and 8 mm wide. |
|
| Seeds |
Seeds not seen, rarely produced. |
|
| Chromosomes |
2n = 22. |
|
| Contributor |
Nancy Khan |
