Nature notes 2022 (6) - roofed with gold
May. 3rd, 2022 08:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
anna_wingToday the Pterocarpus indicus was in bloom all over the city. This is a tree common all over Southeast Asia, under a wide variety of names: Burmese rosewood, padauk, angsana, amboyna. It is one of the timbers sold commercially as rosewood. The wood is a bright red-brown, heavy, solid and beautifully figured, a very high-grade timber.
It has small, golden yellow, scented flowers that last for only a day or two, and cover the whole tree in gold when they open. In the monsoon tropics, the flowers bloom at the end of the hot season, just before the rains. They need a specific combination of high temperatures (like the 40C daily ones we've had for the last six weeks) combined with a short but heavy rain (your standard afternoon convection downpour). In seasonless Equatorial Asia they bloom at random when they get that particular combination of heat and rain.
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=pterocarpus+indicus+in+full+bloom&atb=v314-1&iax=images&ia=images
I was so lucky. I happened to have lunch out today, so I saw them all over in my immediate neighbourhood and downtown, shining golden in the sun.
It has small, golden yellow, scented flowers that last for only a day or two, and cover the whole tree in gold when they open. In the monsoon tropics, the flowers bloom at the end of the hot season, just before the rains. They need a specific combination of high temperatures (like the 40C daily ones we've had for the last six weeks) combined with a short but heavy rain (your standard afternoon convection downpour). In seasonless Equatorial Asia they bloom at random when they get that particular combination of heat and rain.
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=pterocarpus+indicus+in+full+bloom&atb=v314-1&iax=images&ia=images
I was so lucky. I happened to have lunch out today, so I saw them all over in my immediate neighbourhood and downtown, shining golden in the sun.
no subject
Date: 2022-05-03 09:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-05-05 01:29 pm (UTC)I can't tell you enough how much I love every little photo or bit of information that you share about any aspect of life over there--I just drink it up. This particular tree I researched in my search for a shade tree in a park in one of my stories. Love it.
no subject
Date: 2022-05-06 01:01 pm (UTC)It's a very good shade tree, but in high-rainfall climates, such as on the Equator, the wood gets green and sappy, and tends to split, with unfortunate results for passers-by. In the monsoon tropics, where it's bone-dry for half the year, the wood is much denser and tougher. You can really tell the difference from teak, just by the weight.
no subject
Date: 2022-05-06 01:23 pm (UTC)And no worries; I knew the photos weren't yours, but you took the time to think to share them, and I'm grateful for that!