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Bauhinia galpinii |
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| | First flowers, August 2024 |
| Common name |
red orchid tree; pride of de Kaap |
| Family |
fabaceae |
| Life cycle |
shrub (Z9-11) |
| Flowers |
red (summer) |
| Size |
to 10' |
| Light |
sun |
| Cultural notes |
drought-tolerant |
Large shrub (can be trained as a small tree) with brick-red flowers. Native to South Africa. Can reportedly tolerate some freezing temperatures once well established in the garden. In its first winter in the garden, our specimen's top growth succumbed to moderate overnight freezes, regrowing from the base by early April – then the same thing happened in 2023, 2024, and 2025. So I'm not so sure I'll ever see it grow into a tree-like form, but I was happy to finally see its flowers in late August of 2024, on lanky growth rising from a tangle of volunteers perennials that have grown up around its base. In 2025, even after a pretty hard freeze from which I didn't attempt to protect it, it regrew strongly in spring, and bloomed by mid-June.
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| | Regrowth from base in April 2022 |
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| | Regrowth April 2023 |
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| | Harder freeze in 2024, still regrowing by late March |
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| | Gangly growth by late season |
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| | Darling little baby leaves (and what looks like some flower buds, too) in late May |
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| | By early June, those baby buds have grown |
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| | Flowers in mid-June. As you can see, this specimen is a favorite of (probably) leafcutter bees, with almost all leaves missing circular cutouts – which doesn't appear to bother it much |
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In our garden, this plant grows in the following area: back fence border About my plant portraits
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Last modified:
June 15, 2025
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