Floricard - A record of Flora around me

Scientific Name: Tecoma stans or Stenolobium stans IUCN Status: Least Concern It is also called as Yellow Trumpet Flower or Yellow Elder. It is the official flower of US Virgin Islands and it is the floral emblem of Bahamas. Its Generic name Tecoma is derived from Nahuatl or Aztec word - Tecomaxochitl which was applied by indigenous peoples of Mexico to plants with tubular flowers resembling a certain earthen ware vessel. (Nahuatl and Aztecs are native people of Mexico and Central America) It is native to Mexico, Central and South America ( Latin America ) , but it is now widely naturalized in tropical regions. It is an erect branched shrub about 2 to 4 meters height. Hence the Species name Stans which means erect. It bears its green foliage almost to the ground. Flowers are clear yellow and fragrant, appear in close dropping clusters from the end of the branchlets. Each bloom is a 2inch trumpet which on emerging from the pale green...

Scientific Name: Duranta erecta or Duranta repens or Duranta spinosa. IUCN Status: Least Concern This invasive flowering shrub of Verbenaceae family is a native of Asia, Africa and Central and South America. It is also called Pigeon Berry and Sky flower . The Genus Duranta is named in honour of 15 th CE Italian Botanist- Castore Durante . The Species erecta means upright. It is an evergreen upright shrub with a height of 1-3m and with bright, shiny leaves. There are usually at least some pairs of spines along the stems, on located at the base of each of the leaf stalks- hence the name Duranta spinosa . It produces clusters of tiny lavender or sky blue coloured flowers in elongated clusters on terminal and auxiliary stems- hence the name Sky Flower . Blue Sky Flowers- petals with central dark stripe Flowers are sub-sessile and each flower made up of 5 fused petals which have darker stripe in the centre. Each flower has 5 green s...

Scientific Name: Nerium odorum or Nerium indica IUCN Status: Least Concerned It is also called as Rose Laurel or Rose bay . Its Genus name Nerium is the Latinized form of Greek word of the plant Nerion , which is in turn derived from Greek word for water- Neros , because of its natural habitat along rivers and streams. Because of this character of growing along the bays, it is also called Rose Bay . The ancient city of Volubilis in Morocco, took its name from Walilt the Berber name of this oleander. (Berber or Amazigh language is an Afro-asiatic language) Around 300 BCE Theophrastus in his book “ Enquiries into Plants ” described a shrub called Onotheras which modern editors render as Oleander. Its original home is Mediterranean region and Arabian Peninsula. Now-a-days planted in many tropical and subtropical areas of the world. Oleander is the official flower of Hiroshima , having been the first to bloom following atomic bombing of the cit...