''Erythrina lysistemon'' is a species of

deciduous In the fields of horticulture and botany, the term deciduous () means "falling off at maturity" and "tending to fall off", in reference to trees and shrubs that seasonally shed Leaf, leaves, usually in the autumn; to the shedding of petals, aft ...

tree In botany, a tree is a perennial plant with an elongated stem, or trunk, usually supporting branches and leaves. In some usages, the definition of a tree may be narrower, e.g., including only woody plants with secondary growth, only ...

in the

pea Pea (''pisum'' in Latin) is a pulse or fodder crop, but the word often refers to the seed or sometimes the pod of this flowering plant species. Peas are eaten as a vegetable. Carl Linnaeus gave the species the scientific name ''Pisum sativum' ...

family, ''

Fabaceae Fabaceae () or Leguminosae,International Code of Nomen ...

''. It is native to

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

. Common names include common coral-tree, lucky bean tree, umsintsi ( Xhosa), muvhale (

Venda Venda ( ), officially the Republic of Venda (; ), was a Bantustan in northern South Africa. It was fairly close to the South African border with Zimbabwe to the north, while, to the south and east, it shared a long border with another black hom ...

), mophete (

Tswana Tswana may refer to: * Tswana people, the Bantu languages, Bantu speaking people in Botswana, South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Zambia, and other Southern Africa regions * Tswana language, the language spoken by the (Ba)Tswana people * Tswanaland, ...

), koraalboom or kanniedood (

Afrikaans Afrikaans is a West Germanic languages, West Germanic language spoken in South Africa, Namibia and to a lesser extent Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe and also Argentina where there is a group in Sarmiento, Chubut, Sarmiento that speaks the Pat ...

), mokhungwane ( Sotho) and mutiti ( Shona). It is regularly cultivated as a tree for gardens and parks.

Description

Common coral tree reaches in height, with smooth grayish bark, not corky; hooked prickles scattered on trunk and branches;

leaves A leaf (: leaves) is a principal appendage of the stem of a vascular plant, usually borne laterally above ground and specialized for photosynthesis. Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", while the leaves, stem, ...

with 3 leaflets, up to long, petiole and midrib prickly. The tree is leafless for up to 4 or 5 months of the year. The lovely scarlet red

flower Flowers, also known as blooms and blossoms, are the reproductive structures of flowering plants ( angiosperms). Typically, they are structured in four circular levels, called whorls, around the end of a stalk. These whorls include: calyx, m ...

s are borne in dense

raceme A raceme () or racemoid is an unbranched, indeterminate growth, indeterminate type of inflorescence bearing flowers having short floral stalks along the shoots that bear the flowers. The oldest flowers grow close to the base and new flowers are ...

s in spring before leaves and attract numerous birds and insects to the garden. It is hardy to USDA Zone 9b.

References

External links

*https://pza.sanbi.org/erythrina-lysistemon {{Taxonbar, from=Q3644036 lysistemon Trees of South Africa Medicinal plants of Africa Ornamental trees Taxa named by John Hutchinson (botanist)