木棉 Bombax ceiba

  • Scientific Name: Bombax ceiba L.
  • Ref: Sp. Pl.:511. 1753
  • Synonyms: Bombax malabaricum DC.; Gossampinus malabarica (DC.) Merr.; Salmalia malabarica (DC.) Schott & Endl.
  • English Common Name: cotton tree, red silk-cotton; red cotton tree
  • Chinese Common Name: 木棉 mùmián, 红棉 hóngmián, 攀枝花 pānzhī∙huā, 英雄树 [粤]jing1 hung4 syu6
  • Japanese Common Name: キワタ [木棉] kiwata
  • Family: Malvaceae
  • Genus: Bombax
  • Distribution: Hot dry river valleys, savanna; below 1400 m. Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Hainan, Jiangxi, Sichuan, Taiwan, Yunnan [Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Sri Lanka; introduced elsewhere].
  • Photo: South China Botanical Garden, Guangdong
Trees to 25 m tall; trunk buttressed, usually very spiny on young trees; bark gray-white; branches spreading. Stipules minute; petiole 10-20 cm; leaflets 5-7, petiolules 1.5-4 cm; blades oblong to oblong-lanceolate, 10-16 × 3.5-5.5 cm, glabrous, lateral veins 15-17 on each side of midrib, ascending, base broad or tapering, apex acuminate. Flowers solitary, terminal, ca. 10 cm in diam. Calyx cup-shaped, 2-3(-4.5) cm, abaxially glabrous, adaxially densely yellowish sericeous, calyx lobes 3-5, semi-orbicular, ca. 1.5 × 2.3 cm. Petals usually red, sometimes orange-red, obovate-oblong, 8-10 × 3-4 cm, fleshy, both surfaces stellate puberulent, but sparser adaxially. Filament tube short, filaments thicker at base than apex, outer series in 5 fascicles, each with more than 10 stamens, inner series bifid, central filaments with 10 stamens shorter, entire. Capsule ellipsoid, 10-15 × 4.5-5 cm, densely gray-white villous and stellate puberulent. Seeds many, obovate, smooth. Fl. Mar-Apr, fr. summer. (Flora of China)

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