I love this Sterculia cordata when it is covered with a dense crown of leaves and clusters of pendulous pink flowers.
Taken this morning, this tree in my neighbourhood park was almost completely bald. The recent hot and dry spell must have caused it to shed its leaves. So it is a deciduous tree after all!
Frankly, I think this post surpassed the one on Grevillea in terms of the number of photos because I just cannot decide which photos to drop.
I love Sterculia trees because of the interesting beautiful flowers. In an earlier post, I talked about the Sterculia rubiginosa at HortPark. When I first saw this flowering S. cordata, I fell in love with its strong architectural form and branches. So I planted a few at HortPark but they are still so small in comparison to this huge one at my neighbourhood.
I do not know why the name of this tree is given the specific epithet cordata because I don't find the leaves having a distinct heart-shaped as characterized by the term. Anyway, there were just a few branches with leaves and flowers and that was all it took for me to snap away with my camera this morning. Midway, my camera batteries failed me and I had to come back a second time to continue with the photo taking.
It was just so irresistible. On the bare branches, I could see leaf buds and new leaves emerging from the tips and leaf nodes. I can almost imagine this tree planted as a solitary tree in the middle of a grass hill and me just lying beneath it on the grass, just admiring the beauty of this tree as I watch the clouds drift by. Hmm, how serene this all feels?
