Aerva

Aerva is a woody, prostrate or succulent perennial herb of the amaranth family, native to the tropics of Africa and Asia and a common weed on the plains of India. Its root smells of camphor. The dried flowers, which look like soft spikes, are sold as Buikallan and Boor. It is one of the Dasapushpam, the ten sacred flowers of Kerala. The leaves and whole plant are edible, and in folk medicine in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana the crushed leaves are made into a warm paste with jaggery in castor oil and applied to thorn wounds. At Sankranti, a snippet of the plant is traditionally placed in the centre of the cow-dung balls called Gobbemmalu. The page also records it as a traditional snakebite medicine and says its wound-healing effects have not been studied much.