Batwing Coral Tree

We planted a Bat-wing Coral Tree (Erythrina vespertilio, also known as a Bat’s-wing Coral Tree or Bean Tree) in our garden about fifteen years ago and it is now well above the roofline of our high-set house.  The most obvious characteristic of the foliage is the leaf shape which gives us the first half of its common name:

bat-shaped leaves
Leaves … little bats flying away from their twigs

A characteristic which becomes painfully obvious to those who walk barefoot round our garden is that the tree drops twigs and they are savagely spiky.

branch with thorns
Spiny branch

But why is is a “coral” tree?

red flowers
Flowers

The flowers are the answer but I may never have known except for a visit to the Town Common last weekend. There I saw a small tree in flower:

leafless flowering tree
The tree growing wild in the Town Common Conservation Park

When I got close enough I saw the new leaves and recognised it. It was almost leafless, but a lot of our tropical trees follow the same sequence, losing their leaves during the Dry season, flowering as the Wet approaches and then putting out new leaves. I saw a Native Gardenia in the same state on the same day, while the Kapok trees had mostly finished flowering recently and bore green seed-pods.

The specimen in our garden has never, to my knowledge, flowered; the most I’ve ever seen is a small cluster of buds. I suspect it just gets too much water; I know Poincianas flower much better when not watered – trees on road verges or in neglected gardens lose all their leaves, flower abundantly and then burst into leaf but those that are watered regularly merely lose a few leaves, flower moderately and then resume leaf production.

More information: Erythrina vespertilio on the site of the Australian Native Plants Society (Australia), formerly known as the Association of Societies for Growing Australian Plants (ASGAP). There’s a related species, the Pine Mountain coral tree, here. Other relations are pests as per this web page. 

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