The shrub has an interesting life cycle; It comes alive and green every year with the advent of monsoon, but once the rainy season is over, all that is left is dry and dead-looking stems.

[7][10][11] Plants that bloom at long intervals like Strobilanthes callosa are known as plietesials, the term plietesial has been used in reference to perennial monocarpic plants “of the kind most often met with in the Strobilanthinae” (a subtribe of Acanthaceae containing Strobilanthes and allied genera) that usually grow gregariously, flower simultaneously following a long interval, set seed, and die.

Leaves opposite, 7 by 3 in., sometimes much larger, crenate, rough, conspicuously marked with five lines above, nerves 8-16 pair; petiole 2-3 in.

Calyx 1/2 in., in fruit often exceeding 3/4 in., sub-equally 5-lobed to the base; segments oblong, obtuse, softly hairy.

long, thin, obovate, acute, densely shaggy with white inelastic adpressed hair, except on the large oblong areoles.

"It covers large areas on the Konkan and N. Kanara ghats, and forms the undergrowth in many of the deciduous moist forests.

With the coming of the monsoon and the first rains in the next year, the dried fruits absorb moisture and burst open with a pop, the hillsides where Strobilanthes callosa grows are filled with these loud popping sounds of dried seed pods bursting open somewhat explosively dehiscing their seeds for dispersal and soon new plants germinate taking root in the wet forest floor.

[11] While the leaves of Strobilanthes callosa are poisonous,[1][18] and unfit for human consumption, the plant is used as a traditional medicinal herb by the local adivasi tribals and villagers[1] for the treatment of inflammatory disorders.

[11] The plant has been the subject of scientific research which confirms its use in folk medicine as a valid anti-inflammatory and antimicrobial herbal drug[6] with anti-rheumatic activity.

[4] Related species include Strobilanthes cusia BREMEK (大青葉, Da Ching Yeh, タイセイヨウ), used in Chinese[19] and Japanese herbal medicine,[20] and Strobilanthes forrestii Diels (Wei Niu Xi), used in Chinese herbal medicine.

[21] Strobilanthes callosa has sturdy stems which along with its leaves is generally used by the local adivasi tribals and villagers as thatching material to build their huts.

[7][10][11] The following Western Ghats forestry report from the year 1908 of Ankola high forests in coastal Karnataka (then under Bombay Presidency), provides methods to clear and control this shrub, when required, from spreading uncontrollably into unwanted areas: () That the growth of Karvi (Sirobilanthes callosus) in many places is very heavy and is a direct check on natural regeneration.

In the Jaunsar Division areas were successfully treated in 1906 by cutting S. Wallichi when the flowers were fully out and the fruit had begun to form, but was not actually ripe.

Seed-lings will suffer relatively little by burning as they have only appeared in the patches where Karvi is absent.The Karvi bush as it is locally known grows in abundance in the western ghat hills near the metropolis of Mumbai including throughout the Sanjay Gandhi National Park as in other parts of its natural range.

[10] Near Mumbai, the Karvi is also found in Karnala, the Yeoor hills, Tungareshwar and some parts of Goregaon including Film City.