Gulmohar

Gulmohar (Delonix regia)




I'm very lucky to live in a house surrounded by trees, and luckier that majority of them happen to be Gulmohar, my favorite flowering tree. In the flowering season, we get awesome views from almost every window in the house, including the bathroom windows. My favorite is the kitchen window where I have spent many moments enjoying cups of chai admiring the flowers with the squirrels and parrots to keep me company.

the flowers make for gorgeous bokeh too

the view from our balcony looking at our street

the squirrels like snacking on the silky petals

my baby likes it too

The cheery flowers never fail to put a smile on my face. My hard disk is groaning with the number of photos I have taken of these flowers last summer. The photos here are all taken from inside my house.

the individual flowers are stunning too

Gulmohar is from the Fabaceae family and flowers from April to July. It is grown as a street tree mainly for its ornamental properties. An Indian summer is incomplete without the flamboyant flowers.

This is my entry for orange at flower fest.

Purplicious

I'm so excited now that flower fest is back. Apart from inspiring me to go look for wildflowers, this blog gets a new lease on life.

In this round of FF, like the last time, I'm going to try as much as possible to send in entries of wildflowers. First up is purple and here are my two entries.

The first one is Wild Brinjal or Purple Fruited Pea Eggplant



Brinjal is a plant from the family Solanaceae, native to India and Sri Lanka. The wild plant has large prickly leaves and star shaped flowers that are white or purple. The Wild Brinjal has berry like fruit with tiny numerous seeds. This particular plant did not have any, else I would have scavenged some, as we like to eat it cooked with onion, tomato, tamarind and other Indian spices. I think the berries are used in Thai cooking well.


My second entry is the Crown Flower or Giant Milkweed from the family Asclepiadaceae.

Commonly found growing in fields and ditches, the plant has flowers growing in clusters with each flower containing five petals with a crown in the center.


The plant attracts small birds, a number of insects and butterflies. The flowers bloom throughout the year, but are abundant in the summer months. This type of Milkweed is native to India. I took these pictures on my morning walk.

I'm sending these to this month's FF.











PS I'm going to pretend like I've never been away!