Eythrina herbacea
Family: Fabaceae
Plant Description: Prickly, woody-based perennial or deciduous shrub to 2 m or higher. Leaves trifoliate, alternate, the leaflets mostly 3-7 cm long. Flowers in spikelike racemes, bilateral, red. Upper petal 3-5 cm long. Fruit are legumes up to 9 inches long, black when mature constricted between the seeds, seeds red.
Plant Trivia: All parts are poisonous.
Field Identification: Many branches from ground, swollen basally.
Occurrence: Frequent in coastal sands from Aransas Refuge to Flour Bluff.
Bloom Period: Spring-Fall
Plant Use: Showy and attractive, used in landscaping. Seeds have been ground and used for rat poison in Mexico. Hummingbirds utilize this species as a nectar plant.
stxflora 