Sea of Spider Tree Flowers in the Urban Areas

Published on 9 April 2020

In springs, my friends always travelled abroad to enjoy beautiful scenery of flowers. But by picking the right time, you can still find beautiful trees and flowers in the urban areas of Hong Kong.

Spider Tree is one of the must-sees. It is a common deciduous urban tree in Hong Kong and may reach 15 metres in height. It has a Chinese name which means "vegetables on the treetop". What is it meant? People in Yunnan province of China pickle the young leaves of Spider Tree as a preserved vegetable. Besides, the wood of Spider Tree is light yet strong, and can be crafted into fish-shaped wooden baits.

Spider Tree has elegant tree form and it flowers from mid to late-April. There are luxuriant flowers clustered at the ends of the branches during blossoming. After the spring rains, I love walking along Prince Edward Road West, Boundary Street or Chatham Road South near the Science Museum to immerse myself in the magnificent sea of creamy yellow flowers of the Spider Trees there. These flowers are quite special if you take a closer look at them. The white coloured petals will turn yellow gradually. Each flower possesses many elongated stamens which are much longer than the petals. The elongated stamens look like the spider legs and this is why the tree gets its name as "Spider Tree".

Planting trees in the urban areas not only beautifies our environment, but is also beneficial to the ecology. The larvae of Great Orange Tip butterflies feed on the leaves of Spider Tree, and that means you have a good chance to see the largest Pieridae butterflies in Hong Kong flying around.

The sea of Spider Tree flowers.

The colour of Spider Tree flowers will change from white to yellow gradually.

Each flower of Spider Tree
possesses ten or more dark red
stamens.
 

Great Orange Tip, as its name suggests, has large attractive orange patches on its wing tips.