Organic Bael Fruit, Color : Green

The bael fruit tree is slow-growing, of medium size, up to 40 or 50 ft (12-15 m) tall with short trunk, thick, soft, flaking bark, and spreading, sometimes spiny branches, the lower ones drooping. Young suckers bear many stiff, straight spines. A clear, gummy sap, resembling gum arabic, exudes from wounded branches and hangs down in long strands, becoming gradually solid. It is sweet at first taste and then irritating to the throat. The deciduous, alternate leaves, borne singly or in 2's or 3's, are composed of 3 to 5 oval, pointed, shallowly toothed leaflets, 1 1/2 to 4 in (4-10 cm) long, 3/4 to 2 in (2-5 cm) wide, the terminal one with a long petiole. New foliage is glossy and pinkish-maroon. Mature leaves emit a disagreeable odor when bruised.

Properties : The Aegle Marmelos roots are sweet, astringent, bitter and antipyretic. They are useful in dyspepsia, dysentery, diarrhoea, especially for patients having diarrhoea alternating with spells of constipation, stomachalgia, cardiopalmus, uropathy, gastric irritability in infants, vomiting, intermittent fever, vitiated conditions of vata, seminal weakness, and swellings. The leaves of Bael fruit are astringent, febrifuge, laxative and expectorant, and are useful in inflammations, ophthalmia, deafness, catarrh, diabetes and asthmatic complaints. The unripe Bael fruits are bitter, acrid, sour, astringent, digestive and stomachic, and are useful in diarrhoea, dysentery and stomachalgia and helps in improving appetite and digestion. The ripe Bael fruits are astringent, sweet, aromatic, cooling, febrifuge, laxative and tonic, and are good for the heart and brain and in dyspepsia. Sweet drinks (Sharbats) prepared from the pulp of the fruits are useful as soothing agents for intestines of patients who have just recovered from bacillary dysentery. The antibiotic activity of the leaf, fruit and root of Aegle marmelos plant has been confirmed in some recent experiments.