Scientific Name : Tabebuia impetiginosa (Mart. ex DC.) Standl.
Common Name : Purple Tabebuia, Pink Trumpet Tree, Red Lapacho
Chinese Name : 紫花風鈴木
Family : BIGNONIACEAE
Local distribution status : Exotic species
| Origins | Distributed in Northwest Mexico to Northwest Argentina. |
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| Applications | In its native range, the Purple Tabebuia is used as a folk medicine to treat a range of diseases, including a skin disease known as “impetigo”, hence the species epithet “impetiginosa” is given in its scientific name. In recent years, Hong Kong has introduced the Purple Tabebuia as a street tree and an ornamental plant. Entering the flowering period, the view is dominated by deep violet and bright red hues. The tree crown dyed purple as it is congested with the dense flowers, while a purple carpet is formed by the fallen flowers resting on the ground. The scenery it provided dizzyingly overwhelms your focus. |
| Ecology | The natural habitat of the Purple Tabebuia is seasonal dry and deciduous or semi-deciduous forest, hence the species is equipped with higher drought tolerance. When it blooms, you could observe the throat of its flowers, which undergoes changes in colour. It starts off as bright yellow, indicating the nectar-seeking insects that nectar is available in this flower; later it changes to purplish red, similar to the colour of the corolla, telling the insects nectar has run out. Biologically, this patch of colour is called as “nectar guide”, which leads the nectar-seeking animals to the site where nectar is secreted, meanwhile allows the animals carry pollens from one flower to another one for the completion of pollination process. This is one of the reproductive strategies of plants. |
| National Tree | The species is the national tree of Paraguay of South America. |
| Growing habit | Deciduous tree. |
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| Height | To 30 m. |
| Stems | Bark of trunk grey, nearly smooth, slightly longitudinally furrowed. |
| Leaves | Palmately compound leaves. Leaflets 5 to 7, ovate to elliptic, margin of apical half sometimes irregularly serrate. Membranaceous to chartaceous, lepidote on both surfaces, axils of lateral veins with hairs abaxially. Central leaflet larger, lateral leaflets progressively smaller, with petiolules, like a hand in outline. Leaves fallen during winter, young leaves emerge after flowering period in spring. |
| Flowers | Petals fused, tubular to campanulate, 5-lobed, with wavy margin, puberulous outside. Corolla magenta, throat yellow in early anthesis, later turns orange to purplish red. Calyx cupular, truncate or 5-teethed, purplish red, densely pubescent. |
| Fruits | Capsule elongated-cylindrical, attenuate at both ends, length to 0.5 m, glabrous, green, turns dark brown when mature. |
| Seeds | Narrowly elliptic, with a pair of hyaline membranous wings. |
| Flowering period | Spring in Hong Kong. |
| Fruiting period | Closely after the end of flowering period. |
Scientific name above is based on Tropicos.org: https://www.tropicos.org/name/3700644
Scientific names from other databases
― Plants of the World Online : Handroanthus impetiginosus (Mart. ex DC.) Mattos