Caesalpinia mexicana
Family: Fabaceae
Plant Description: Trees with brittle branches, up to 19 feet tall; leaflets on each pinna up to 5 pairs, each up to1 inch long. Flowers slightly bilateral, bright yellow, sometimes with red; petals up to1/2 inches long, each one of them slightly different. Fruit a legume, brown, up to 2 3/8 inches long.
Plant Trivia: When seed pods open during the heat of the, they explode out their seeds such that if they hit a metal building, it sounds like gravel being thrown at the building.
Field Identification:
Occurrence: Spring – Summer
Bloom Period:
Plant Use: Species is a host plant for the curve-wing metalmark butterfly. Attractive plant used for landscaping.
Key to Genera if needed:
stxflora 