Decaisnea fargesii

Dead man's fingers, blue sausage fruit, blue cucumber shrub or blue bean tree is a member of the Lardizabalaceae family. Dead man's fingers is found in Chinese and Nepalese woodlands and scrub between 500 m and 2500 m elevation.

Some researchers recognize a separate species, Decaisnea insignis with a native habitat of montane forests of northern India, Myanmar and Bhutan at elevation between 2000 m and 3000 m.

The common name is a reference to the cylindrical, rather rubbery, necrotic purple fruits which resemble a dead hand in appearance and texture.

• Leaves are odd-pinnate, 60 to 90 cm long, with up to 25 ovate to elliptic leaflets each up to 15 cm long and 10 cm broad. Some scientists also recognize Decaisnea insignis with compound leaves up to 2.0 m long.
• Individual plants are monoecious (separate male and female flowers on the same plant), flowers in long drooping panicles 25 to 50 cm long, flowers with greenish-yellow sepals and no petals, each flower 3—6 cm wide.
• Fruit is a cylindrical, bean-like seed pod to 10 cm long, that ripens to purple in fall. Fruits will split open at maturity to reveal a large mass of seeds imbedded in edible, sticky pulp. Some researchers recognize the second species, Decaisnea insignis, as having green (not purple) pods. Other researchers choose to regard Decaisnea as a single very variable species that is polymorphic for fruit colour. In this case, the scientific name is Decaisnea insignis.