Over the last few weeks, you may have noticed puffs of light purple flowers in the tree canopies. Or if you’re a walker, you may have seen your path strewn with small lilac-colored blooms. If so, you’ve seen Chinaberry trees (Melia azedarach) in full bloom.
The five-petaled, light purple flowers with dark centers appear in April-May. Though they smell sweet, butterflies and bees do not visit them, so they don’t add to the food sources for pollinators. Birds, however, eat the berries, digest the pulp, then ‘deposit’ the hard seeds, spreading the trees throughout yards and woodlands.
Chinaberry has lacy, glossy foliage, arranged in compound leaves (think fern-like). The tree reaches 40’ or more and is one of our few purple flowering trees. Another is Empress Tree (Paulownia tomentosa), also an invasive exotic. That one has flowers that look like foxglove and smell like cough syrup.
Chinaberry was introduced to the US via Georgia and South Carolina, as an ornamental in about 1830. Widely planted, it then escaped cultivation and popped up across the southeast. The fruits are light yellow and hang on the tree into winter. If uneaten by birds, they rot and stink. It was dubbed “chinaberry” because the china-white, ridged seeds inside the yellow pulp of the berry-like drupes are so hard, they have been used in crafts. Priests are said to have strewn the seeds along their travels to have a ready supply of beads for rosaries on future trips.
Chinaberry grows naturally in India and a swath of Asia into Australia. It goes by several common names including Persian lilac, pride of India, beadtree, and others. In some areas of its natural range, plant parts are stored with foodstuffs to keep bugs out due to insect repelling properties of leaves, fruits, and seeds. Though plant parts of toxic to humans and especially cats, its phytochemical, Liminoid, is used in cancer and antimalarial drugs.
Though not native to the US, Chinaberry has naturalized into our woodlands. The problem with that is they take space, water, and sunlight from the plants that should be there supporting the rest of the ecosystem. Invasive exotics are freeloaders and subtract from the variety of plants that belong here.
But in this case, there is a bright side. Chinaberry is related to mahogany, and like its relative, its wood is valuable—medium-density, ranging in color from light brown to the gorgeous red associated with mahogany or teak. Seasoning of the wood for use in crafts and furniture is simple as it dries without cracking or warping and is resistant to fungus. So woodworkers, get your chainsaws revving, and harvest this beautiful wood while ridding our woodlands of an invasive pest.
———————————————————————————————————————
Donna H. Black writes articles, fiction, poetry, and more. A horticulturist by training and a writer by choice, she enjoys bringing facts of the natural world to readers. Follow her blog about writing and nature at donnablackwrites.com and find her books on Amazon.com.
donnablackwrites 