Balsams of the genus Impatiens are found across the northern Hemisphere and tropical regions. They are annual or perennial herbaceous plants or small shrubs, distinguished by their seed capsules, which explode when touched, and can scatter seeds over several meters. Due to this habit some Balsams have become highly invasive plants, rapidly coming to dominate ecosystems where they have no natural predators or pathogens.
In a paper published in the journal PhytoKeys on 7 February 2017, Seong-Hyun Cho of the International Biological Material Research Center at the Korea Research Institute of Bioscience and Biotechnology, Bo-Yun Kim and Han-Sol Park of the Department of Life Science at Hallym University, Chhang Phourin of the Forestry Administration of the Kingdom of Cambodia and Young-Dong Kim, also of the Department of Life Science at Hallym University, describe a new species of Balsam from Phnum Bokor National Park, in Kampot Province, Cambodia.
The new species is named Impatiens bokorensis, where 'bokorensis' means 'from Bokon'. It is an annual herb reaching about 40 cm in height, which were found growing on sandstone tables in an evergreen tropical forest at about 1050 m above sealevel. The plants flowered in August and bore fruit in November.
Impatiens bokorensis, growth habit. Seong-Hyun Cho in Cho et al. (2017).
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