LOTUSES AND THE MOON

[Dominik Wujastyk]

Dear Allen (and all),

Thank you so much for taking the trouble to follow up the
Kumuda-flowering-by-night question.  I too have been unable yet to find
any *botanical* description of Nymphaea lotus, Linn. that mentions
anything about blooming at night.  There do exist Indian plants which
bloom at night, like the nishaagandhi cactus (a neologism for
Phyllocactus latifrons (gen. epiphyllum);  in a recent newspaper article
about this cactus, in the Hindu, the author referred to it as "moon
lover", without any reason beyond poetic fancy).  But not the kumuda?

Come on, Ashok and Madhav: didn't you sit beside a tank of kumudas all
night during your youth?  What happened (to the flowers, I mean :-).

Dominik