Ambatch

Shrub or small tree with a swollen, pithy, often conical stem. Branches with sticky glandular hairs and armed with short sharp spines. Leaves pinnate with 20-40 oblong, often emarginate leaflets, mostly hairless above, blue-green and pubescent below, particularly on the margin and mid-vein. Petiole and rhachis covered with bristly hairs and often with minute spines. Flowers in 1-4-flowered axillary inflorescences, yellow to orange on the standard. Pods spirally contorted, 10-14 cm long, 6-17-jointed, densely covered in bristly glandular hairs.

Throughout tropical Africa and Madagascar. Cultivated in Egypt, Java and South America.