A flush of pink

The flowering trees of Bangalore are in splendour. Tabibuea Rose steals the show

April 06, 2015 07:33 pm | Updated 08:01 pm IST

The Tabibuea Rosea was never part of our Bangalore skyline until very recently. Jacarandas, Gulmohurs, Champa, Rain trees with their pink powder puff flowers were more the norm. Over the last decade the Tabibuea in an array of colours has been imported from continental America and the trees seem to be flourishing across avenues, planted in the newer layouts in the city. In five years this fast-growing tree can reach 25 to 30 metres high and can burst into panicles of delicate pink trumpet shaped flowers with yellow throats, any time between December to March. Belonging to the Jacaranda family the pink trumpet tree is flowering across Bangalore city in great abundance at the moment, making flower lovers hearts skip a beat.

“Walking out of a friend’s house in Fraser town I was amazed to see a car, parked under a Tabibuea Rosea in bloom, covered in a mound of fallen flowers across its bonnet and hood,” shared Annika Cutinha who lives in Fraser Town. “The lack of leaves during the bloom, makes the tree extremely showy.”

Flower lover Keerti Ramachandra says the flowers look like, “heaps of candy-floss, or pink tinted meringue”, While Aubrey Millet says “the flowers leave people visiting Bangalore from other cities purple with envy.”

“These Tabibuea trees with their soft pastel shades make me very happy. Like Nature's embroidery against the pale blue summer sky,” says Sneha Naidu. While Jacqueline Colaco finds that “These flowers coyly preen their delicate pink blossoms, amidst a blaze of spring’s other striking, beautiful hues, of majentas, purples and yellows, in our city of Bangalore.”

The Tabibuea Rosea flowers on graceful, wide-spreading branches in early Spring, which in Bangalore is from March to May, during a brief deciduous period.

“These flowers remind me of these epic sequences in the Japanese Anime cartoons where the hero is going to give his best. I don't know if it's the same tree, but it always reminds me of those scenes,” says Visual Communication student Solomon. While another student Catherine Preethi goes all poetic saying, "It's like heaven on earth... with all those clouds of flowers blossoming everywhere in the city."

A rapidly growing tree, it can attain a height of 30 feet in the first three years of life, and it has an average lifespan of 50 years. Following the flowering, seedpods form, and they measure almost 6 inches in length. The seedpods ripen over the year and the feathery seeds are dispersed all over the ground below the tree.

“The tree in bloom looks like a giant sized bouquet! God's way of reminding you that life is beautiful. Enjoy it!” says Madhurita Ghosh. While an enthusiastic Steffi Xavier says, “When I ride my bike in the scorching heat cribbing and unhappy, travelling on the outer Ring Road, I look up at the pink and yellow heaven of flowers above and want to scream out I love my city.”

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