Pseudobombax ellipticum

[Stan]

This has been potted,then tried in ground where it did pretty well...then dug up as plants around it outgrew it. Since then in a pot. I imagine for bay areans this could be a nice sculptural shrub..open growth,keeping the caudex like base and maybe kept 8-10' tall. 2007 nearly killed it..at the time it was about 3 years old ? It sprouted but..too slow for its own good.
But for somebody with room,all day sun and knows what they are doing from the start its worth the occasional trouble.

[Stan]

That plant you see? It nearly doubled in mass from that photo to the end of its growing season. It really took off when I put a saucer under it- about when I took the photo. I had always watered and fertilized it...but with its root tips always drawing up water it grew very fast. As of right now,I dont know if I should cut it far back like most are,or just let it become a big potted plant.
Its look as I write is like a Schefflera. A Schefflera with a turquoise striped bulbous trunk.

[Stan]

Here's todays photos

[Stan]

One year later. It did this winter get tips killed back. It has been since..2007? the last time that happened. We were not even that cold. Just the combo of one 32f and all that wet I guess.
Note Mangoes hanging off to the right. Proud of that.

[Jkwinston]

Looking good Stan ! Keep up the good work. Jkw

[Stone Jaguar]

I agree - a really nice job with that tree, Stan.

Peter de Vosjoli's great books on caudexed and bonsai succulents opened a lot of Mexican and CentrAm succulent growers' eyes to the rough-cut gems that road-clearing crews were leaving behind with their machete and weed-whacker work. I used to go collect with a botanist friend of mine who really likes these repetitively-topped Pseudobombax and Bursera schlechtendalii and work over road cuts in the arid and dry forests of central Guatemala and Chiapas, Mexico in the search for exceptionally weird-looking ones.

While there are some rarely-cultivated southern wet forest spp (like P. septenatum) that have more striking bark color, trees from Mesoamerican TDF can have quite handsome trunks as well. As a canopy tree, P. ellipticum can attain immense height and size in lowland wet forest where they look nothing like those from deserts and can only be recognized by their distinctive leaves.

A wild child from central Guatemala in 2007 and its kissin' cousin growing freebird in a bed in Chandler, AZ this past June.

Pseudombax dry forest.JPG (111.08 KiB) Viewed 2612 times

Pseudobombax AZ.jpg (155.03 KiB) Viewed 2612 times

J

[Stan]

Thanks Jay. I hear there is one at the Stanford botanical desert garden. I have to get there. It sounds like the only exotic they have to mostly all hardy C&S.

[Stan]

Taken the other day. This year,It started with the tips frosted back. I think your experts eyes can see the change in stem angles.