Hong Kong Orchid

Bauhinia x blakeana

Beng: Kanchan (all Bauhinias are called Kanchan, often with a color/adjective before it. However, the first names are hardly standardized)

A small/medium nearly evergreen tree with short, crooked trunk with roundish bilobed leaves cleft about some (way usually not overlapping along the inner margin). Flowers are large purple with five petals

Leaf: 6’’- 8’’. Overall roundish and camel foot like bilobed. Cleft usually less than halfway into the leaf and usually without overlap along the inner margin.

Flower: Purple-Magenta, orchid-like 5 petals, middle one darker

Fruit: Usually does not fruit and in case it does, no seeds are produced

Season: The flowers appear in large number among the leaves in October-November and lasts till March.

Range/habitat:  This tree is considered an accidental natural hybrid that happened in Hong Kong and was discovered in 1908. Its parents are Bauhinia pupurea and B. variegata, both found in India.

Trivia and notes:  This tree was named after Sir Henry Blake, Governor of Hong Kong from 1898 to 1903. Since it is sterile (like most F1 hybrids), every tree all over the world is directly related to that single individual found in 1908!

Where to Find:  One small individual near the junction where the road from safari park meets the main road that encircles the lake. Another, larger one, inside padma pukur (south-east corner)