Chinese name

Calamus

Latin name

Acorus calamus?L.

Alias

Mud caltrops, scent bushes, wild caltrops, stinking caltrops, mountain caltrops, white caltrops, sword caltrops, big caltrops

Calamus is a perennial herbaceous plant. The rhizome is transverse, slightly compressed, branched, 5-10 millimeters in diameter, with a yellowish-brown, aromatic outer skin and a majority of fleshy roots, 5-6 centimeters long, with hair-like fibrous roots. Leaves basal, basal sides of membranous leaf sheaths 4-5 mm wide, tapering upward to 1/3 of leaf length, gradually disappearing and falling off. Leaf blade sword-shaped linear, 90-100(-150) cm long, 1-2(-3) cm wide at the middle, wide and folded at the base, tapering above the middle, herbaceous, green, shiny; midrib conspicuously elevated on both surfaces, lateral veins 3-5 pairs, parallel, slender, mostly extending to the leaf tip. Inflorescence stalks 3-angled, (15-)40-50 cm long; leafy spathes sword-like and linear, 30-40 cm long; fleshy spikes obliquely upward or suberect, narrowly conical terete, 4.5-6.5(-8) cm long, 6-12 mm in diameter.