Delonix regia

royal poinciana

Royal poinciana is mainly planted as an ornamental shade tree because of its attractive foliage and flamboyant red-orange blooms. Although a beautiful specimen tree, it is not an ideal tree to have beside pools or over parking areas because of the thousands of tiny leaflets that fall throughout the year. Royal poinciana grows like a weed in southern Florida with little supplemental care and it flowers best in full sun. Young branches are especially susceptible to wind damage.

Another common name for this tree is “woman’s tongue” because of the rattling noise made by the seeds inside the seed pods as they blow in the wind. This rattling makes the seed pods useful as maraca-like musical instruments, which are employed throughout the Caribbean. Seeds are used to make beads, as a coffee substitute, and in oil production on a small scale. Young seed pods can be cooked and eaten as a vegetable much like super-sized green beans.

Medicinally, leaves are used in Bangladesh to treat diabetes. A study done in 2011 seems to support this use, as it showed that an extract from the plant’s leaves is effective in reducing the blood glucose levels of hyperglycemic mice as much as other diabetes treatments.