Read about Dolichos lablab in the Standard Cyclopedia of Horticulture
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Dolichos Lablab, Linn. (D. cultratus, Thunb. D. purpureus, Lindl. Lablab cultratus, DC.). Hyacinth Bean. Figs. 1339, 1340, 1341. Tall-twining (often 10-20 ft.): lfts. broad-ovate, rounded below and cuspidate- pointed at the apex, often crinkly: fls. purple or white, rather large, 2- 4 at the nodes, in a long erect raceme: pods small (2-3 in. long) and flat, usually smooth, conspicuously tipped with the persistent style; seed black, mahogany or gray, in the white-fld. varieties, white, small (average weight about ¼ gram). Tropics. B.M. 896. B.R. 830. A.G. 14:84. — Cult. in this country as an ornamental climbing bean, but in the tropics the pods and seeds are eaten. Annual. It is easily grown in any good garden soil. Like common beans it will not endure frost. It is very variable. White-fld. and dwarf bush forms are now offered by seedsmen. A form with white fls. and very large growth is known among horticulturists as D. giganteus (Fig. 1342). D. pseudopachyrrhizus. Harms, recently intro. into some of the European gardens from Trop. Afr., is a perennial form with a large tuberous rootstock: sts. long, round or angular: lvs. long-stalked, 3-foliplate; lfts. very variable in shape, the lateral often ovate or elliptic and the terminal broadly rhomboid, 3¼-8 in. long, 2½-7 in. broad: fls. email, chiefly violet-blue, in racemes ½-1¾ ft. long. Geo. F. Freeman.
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- REDIRECT Lablab purpureus subsp. purpureus