Friday, August 18, 2006

Ipomoea pes-caprae - Beach morning glory (海牵藤 - hai2 qian1 niu2)

I was walking along the embarkment of Seletar Reservoir when I noticed that it was covered with a creeper that had beautiful purplish flowers. At first glance I thought they looked like the morning glory flowers that I was familiar with that grew on fences or dangled from trees. But these flowers were creepers and had thick butterfly-shaped leaves. I wasn't sure if it was a specie of morning glory and searched for images on Google. Found out the name of this particular one and also discovered that there are hundreds to a thousand species of Morning Glory. It was mid-morning when I photographed these flowers and as can be seen, they were in the prime of their morning lives - sturdy and fresh without any wrinkles or sign of aging. What a way to live!
Common name: Beach Morning Glory, Railroad Vine, Bayhops,
Goat's Foot Creeper
Family: convolvulaceae
Native to Florida, USA

More information on this creeper could be found in this document here:http://hort.ifas.ufl.edu/shrubs/IPOPESA.PDF

1 comment:

Mableinsingapore said...

Wonder if this specie like the kangkong will taste just as good with belachan and chilli, yum! Okay, only kidding. I can't bear to eat it after having spent so much time admiring its pretty flowers.