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Shower of gorgeous pinks and vibrant reds

Cassias make attractive, ornamental trees with their beautiful flowers

RIOT OF COLOUR Cassia in full bloom

Cassia javanica and Cassia roxburghii are two attractive, ornamental trees cultivated along roadsides, and in parks and gardens.

Cassia javanica, a showy summer bloomer, with a wide-spreading crown and numerous drooping feathery-leaved branchlets is native to Java. The tree has now naturalised itself in India, Malaysia, southern China and the Philippines. This not-so-common tree produces magnificent flowers, resembling apple blossoms and hence, has earned the popular name "Apple Blossom Shower Tree". Cassia javanica is also known as Pink Shower Tree or Rainbow Shower Tree, since its gorgeous flowers in dense flowering racemes are found in various shades — peach, orange, yellow and red. The leaves are short-stalked, oblong-oval in shape and rounded or blunt at the tips. Cassia roxburghii is a graceful tree with drooping branches that appear to be overweighed by its wealth of pinkish red blossom clusters. In June, the upper surfaces of the transcending branches are laden with copious pink flowers that create a carnival of colours against a clear blue tropical sky. The flowers are small, with conspicuous yellow stamens. It is a fairly large "shower" tree with featherlike pinnately compound leaves and twigs, covered with a dense carpet of fine, soft hairs. The cylindrical and indehiscent fruit is a typical legume which bears many seeds separated by papery partitions. Red cassia or Ceylon Senna, as it is commonly called, is native to Sri Lanka and southern India and is usually propagated by seeds that are scarified (pre-treated before sowing).

PAULINE DEBORAH & RIDLING WALLER

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