CITHAREXYLUM SPINOSUM

Oh, this has to be the biggest Fiddlewood tree in the landscape I have ever come across. The interesting thing is, throughout most of the year, this tree retains its old orangey leaves for a long period of time, and I just love the magnificent autumn view it provides to me.

Everytime I see it, I imagine a major street in Singapore planted with rows of them and wonder how beautiful it would be. It would look just as strikingly eye-catching when planted as an avenue in a park when the leaves take on this fall colour and I look forward to the day when this happens anywhere. If I am not wrong, this usually happens when the weather is drier.

CITHAREXYLUM & CEIBA

The grove of Citharexylum spinosum trees next to the lawn are beautiful but does not really stand out in the photo. On site, the experience is much better with its orangey leaves and fragrant flowers.

The huge Ceiba pentandra tree near the site also looks magnificently outstanding.

STERCULIA FOETIDA

These are some trees at the Nursery Holding Area. I posted about the Citharexylum spinosum and Dalbergia latifolia before.

But I did not mention the towering Sterculia foetida (Family Sterculiaceae). Its flowers may not be as spectacular as the other Sterculias but its palmate leaves are certainly a huge attraction.

CITHAREXYLUM QUADRANGULARE

A tree from the Verbenaceae Family, this is one of my all time favourites for 2 main reasons - the amazingly beautiful orange leaves and the fragrant strings of white flowers.

Commonly known as the Fiddlewood, the synonyms include C. spinosum and C. subserratum. I first came across this tree in my junior college days when I used to go jogging at 6 am when the early morning breeze was so cooling. That was when I encountered this strange overpowering fragrance every time I ran along a certain stretch of the footpath. It was only later that I realized the smell came from this row of trees along the new block of flats.

The love was sealed there and then. When I started working, I learnt more about this tree and ever since then, I always try to use them in my landscaping projects. Some of the roads and parks include CTE near the Balestier Road / Whampoa stretch, Kampong Java Park, HortPark etc.

In recent times, I learnt to appreciate the beauty of a single specimen of these trees. The brilliantly beautiful tree would spot orange leaves from afar that remotely reminded me of autumn. Coupled with the strong sweet fragrance, the tree is simply hard to ignore. Anyway, a link is provided below:

http://toptropicals.com/cgi-bin/garden_catalog/cat.cgi?uid=Citharexylum_spinosum

FIDDLEWOOD TREE

The Citharexylum spinosum (synonym: C. quadrangulare) was flowering profusely in HortPark's Carpark Garden last week. I adore this tree so much that I planted them along the entire periphery of the carpark along the fencing area. So now they were rewarding me for my efforts.

But it looked like I wasn't the only one appreciating and taking in its beauty and fragrance. Up I looked, and there they were. The butterflies were having a silent party of their own. The social butterflies were flitting from flower to flower and from tree to tree extracting the nectar from the countless freshly bloomed white flowers.

There was the familiar Autumn Leaf, Chocolate Soldier, Painted Jezebel butterflies etc. Then there was the unsuspecting Leopard butterfly, whose photo I caught, checking out the Lantana camara flowers at the carpark planters.

With this, I suppose I need no further proof that the Fiddlewood Tree is a nectar plant for a range of butterflies. Convinced now?

HOSEA LOBBIANA

This is an interesting climber that was planted maybe about 6 months ago. The new leaves start out orangey but turn green over time. The orange leaves remind me very much of Citharexylum quadrangulare (Fiddlewood) whose leaves turn the same shade of orange before they senescence and are shed.

The climber on the other end of this trellis at HortPark's Car Park Garden did not produce much new leaves, and hence lack this spectacle. If you look carefully, you would find the clusters of orange flowers being camouflaged amongst the leaves since they bear the same colour. The pink stamens extend very much beyond the corolla of the flower. It looks like a possible nectar plant for butterflies but I have yet to see any visiting the flowers.

Time for me to find a plant with flowers and try it out within the butterfly enclosure. The photos were taken on 7 Dec 09.