I love the beautiful ʻŌhiʻa lehua. The perfect bright red color shows up best against a clear blue volcano area sky! (It is the photo I continue to pursue.)
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| ʻŌhiʻa flower / Hawaii Volcanoes National Park / February 2016 |
I wondered about this filamentous (fluffy) flower and then realized there are a number of such flowers here in Hawai’i. Thus another blog is born!
The lehua blossom is also especially poignant when filmed against the backdrop of an active volcano as there are so many connections, in Hawaiian legend and ecology, between the two. I will mention an ecological connection; the ʻŌhiʻa tree is the first tree to populate new lava fields.
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| ʻŌhiʻa tree in flower / Hawaii Volcanoes National Park / April 2015 |
The filamentous flower does not meet the stereotypical vision of a flower with petals and lovely stamen and pistil coming out of the middle of the flower. But the filamentous flowers are certainly eye-catching in their color uniformity! [Although I do not like to use Wikipedia, this was the only source I could find that labels the flower parts of a filamentous flower.]
I always thought the ʻŌhiʻa must be related to the Bottle Brush. I grew up with a Bottle Brush tree in my yard in San Diego. I know the Bottle Brush is in the Myrtaceae family and then found that indeed the ʻŌhiʻa is also in that family. Classification and photos
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| Some form of Bottle Brush / Aiea Heights neighborhood / April 2016 |
As I thought about this blog I began to see, during some of my runs, a small bush with similar red filamentous flowers.
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| Bush with red filamentous flowers / Mililani neighborhood / April 2016 |
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| Red filamentous flower / Mililani neighborhood / April 2016 |
When I researched the ʻŌhiʻa by it’s scientific name (Metrosideros polymorpha), I found relatives in New Zealand and nearby islands. New Zealand website (takes awhile to load) What a surprise to see our beautiful ʻŌhiʻa nearly identically represented in other Pacific islands. That made me think about the origin of our ʻŌhiʻa species and theories about how the Polynesians first came to Hawai’i. Certainly our native plants “used” some of the same routes as the humans, traveling by water and air!
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| White-yellow filamentous flower tree / near Aloha Stadium / April 2016 |
As I planned this blog, I also noticed what looked like a white-yellow version of a
Bottle Brush. I did not identify it but as I look closely it looks more like a
Eucalyptus tree. This makes sense as the
Eucalyptus is also in the Myrtaceae family.
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| White-yellow filamentous flowers / near Aloha Stadium / April 2016 |
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Some other common plants that I knew also had filamentous flowers are: the Monkeypod tree, Haole Koa, and Acacia. These are from a different family, the Fabaceae (Leguminosae) family. These trees, as many of you have experienced, are some of the prevalent Hawai’i trees with pods to which I referred in another blog. (March 10, 2016: Winter flowering plants / trees in Hawai’i) How to recognize Fabaceae plants
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| Haole koa / Moanalua bike path / April 2016 |
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| Haole koa flowers / Moanalua bike path / April 2016 |
Updated in May with a better photo of Monkeypods in bloom. I had a lone flower on the trees near Moanalua after seeing some Monkeypod trees in Kahala in full flower, showing how trees / plants flower at different times over our island! [As a side note, I saw an article about how Monkeypod trees are being banned from being planted by the city to encourage the planting of native trees. Article from Honolulu magazine ]
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| Monkeypod tree in flower / Moanalua area / May 2016 |
The Haole Koa and Acacia, as you may guess, are related to our native Koa (and also Sandalwood) trees. The Acacia tree looks very similar to the two native trees with its sickle shaped leaves.
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| Acacia / Aloha Stadium area / April 2016 |
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| Acacia flowers / Aloha Stadium area / April 2016 |
These “leaves” are actually called phyllodes and if you look closely on any of these species you might see some tiny juvenile compound true leaves at the tips of these phyllodes.
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| Albizia trees in flower / Aiea Heights area / April 2016 |
I took photos of an Albizia tree (Albizia zygia) in full bloom and wondered if it also had filamentous flowers (they were too far away to see) and in which family it could be found. As the Monkeypod tree’s genus name is Albizia (Albizia saman also listed as Samanea saman), it is more closely related than by family! Thus the Albizia is also a Fabaceae.
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| Albizia tree canopy / Aiea Heights area / April 2016 |
Perhaps indicating a source for their common filamentous flowers, the two families, Fabaceae and Myrtaceae are found on the same, though far removed, “branch” at the Tree of Life Project (On this source, they are called Fabales and Myrtales).
See what other fluffy flowers you could see as you “watch out for nature!”
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