Descriptions of Additional 
FLOWERING TROPICAL TREES 
Now Available for Your Garden 
EGYPT WATTLE (Acacia  seyal). 
Small slender evergreen tree armed with 
white 2-inch spines and bearing copious 
clusters of very fragrant yellow ball flow- 
ers. It is one of the chief gum-yielding 
Acacia of the Nile region. 
ABYSSINIAN WATTLE (Acacia abys- 
sinica). This rapid growing, tall, well- 
shaped evergreen shade tree is now widely 
planted along the Mexican border in New 
Mexico and Arizona as a street and door- 
yard tree. Its profuse yellow ball! flowers 
in spring add to its attractiveness. 
BRAZIL ACACIA (A. visco). Seeds 
of this species came from Rio de Janeiro 
but I have no description of it. 
SAPODILLA (Achras zapota). This 
scarcely belongs in a list of flowering trees, 
but its beautiful shape, evergreen foliage 
and wind-resistance recommend it for 
planting as a street or yard tree, even if 
you do not care for the spicy fruits. 
ADANSONIA DIGITATA 
BAOBAB (Adansonia digitata). One 
of the world’s most remarkable trees. It 
is native to the drier parts of Central Af- 
rica but is sparingly grown in the tropics 
all over the world. It is famous for three 
things: (1) its great age, for specimens 
are known that are believed to rank with 
the Sequoias and some of the other oldest 
living things; (2) its great girth, for in its 
native Africa the trunk is sometimes 30 
feet in diameter, the center becoming hol- 
low so that the tree is like a house, big 
enough to live in; (3) the usefulness of its 
many parts. According to Sturtevant’s 
“Notes on Edible Plants,” the baobab in 
Africa is the most valuable of vegetables. 
Its leaves are used for leaven, its bark for 
cordage and thread. In Senegal the ne- 
groes use the pounded bark and the 
fees as we do pepper and salt. Hooker 
says the leaves are eaten with other food 
and are considered cooling and useful in 
restraining excessive perspiration, The 
fruit is much used by the natives of Sierra 
Leone. It contains a farinaceous pulp 
fall of seeds, which tastes like gingerbread 
and has a pleasant acid flavor. Montciro 
says the leaves are good to eat boiled as 
a vegetable and the seeds are, in Angola, 
pounded and made into meal for food in 
times of scarcity. The tree bears 6-inch 
white flowers of which Colthurst writes: 
“The massive flowers appearing in June 
and July are pendulous, the buds hanging 
like pears from long stalks; the sepaline 
covering resembles pale-green plush, and 
the snowy petals, each 4 inches long, are 
like ivory; from their centre rises a thick 
white column, whose summit is crowned 
with many circles of golden filaments and 
a long curved style. The flower opens at 
midnight, and the vision of beauty it of- 
fers then repays the time spent in watch- 
ing its expansion.” In Florida the tree is 
pot-bellied but has not shown any ten- 
dency to develop an exceptionally big 
trunk, and there are several fine speci- 
an ae 
