Pride of Barbados (Caesalpinia Pulcherrima), a small evergreen perennial shrub with colorful red, pink orange or yellow flowers, is native to the West Indies and Tropical America. As the name suggests, the flower of this plant is Barbados’s National flower. A member of the legume family, this plant has a flattened bean-like pods which pop open at maturity spitting out the seeds. Note how the flower has very long stamens.

I have also seen the yellow version of Pride of Barbados (aptly named ’ the yellow bird of paradise’) in Koh Chang, my favorite beach resort in Thailand, and it is a popular ornamental featured in many gardens throughout Thailand. I took this picture of Nok -Yoong Thai ’ growing in the ” garden just outside my bungalow. There is considerable exchange between Tropical America and Tropical Asia when it comes to colorful tropical ornamentals. Other common names for this colorful perennial are dwarf Poinciana, fence flower, and peacock flower (because of the long stamens).

Source: http://www.tropilab.com/caesal-pul.html

This entry was posted on Saturday, July 29th, 2006 at 3:25 am and is filed under Barbados, nature, Thailand, travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.