Indigofera coerulea

Botanical Description

Indigofera coerulea is a stout shrubby semi-woody herb or shrub that can grow up to 2 metres tall[ 328 Title African Flowering Plants Database Publication Author Website http://www.ville-ge.ch/musinfo/bd/cjb/africa/recherche.php Publisher Conservatoire et Jardin Botaniques. Year 0 ISBN Description Contains information on over 150,000 plant names (including synonyms) giving a description and habitat, plus a distribution map. , 332 Title The Useful Plants of West Tropical Africa. Publication Author Burkil. H. M. Publisher Royal Botanic Gardens; Kew. Year 1985 - 2004 ISBN Description Brief descriptions and details of the uses of over 4,000 plants. A superb, if terse, resource, it is also available electronically on the Web - see http://www.aluka.org/ ]. Indigo, of which this species is a secondary source, has a very long history of use as a dye. Because of its fascinating deep blue colour, its great colour fastness to light and the wide range of colours obtained by combining it with other natural dyes, it has been called 'the king of dyes' and no other dye plants have had such a prominent place in as many civilizations as this genus. It was at one time widely cultivated for this purpose but, with the advent of synthetic dyes, demand for the plant dropped dramatically[ 317 Title Mansfeld's Database of Agricultural and Horticultural Plants Publication Author Website http://mansfeld.ipk-gatersleben.de/pls/htmldb_pgrc/f?p=185:3:4292127278597336 Publisher Year 0 ISBN Description Terse details of a huge range of useful plants. ]. It is still sometimes grown for indigo in drier areas[ 299 Title Protabase - Plant Resources of Tropical Africa. Publication Author Website http://www.prota.org Publisher Year 0 ISBN Description An excellent on-line database with detailed information on over 3,200 species of useful plants of Africa. ].