Saturday, October 27, 2007

Calotropis gigantea - Crown flower (牛角瓜 - niu2 jiao3 gua1)

I first saw these crown flower shrubs a few months ago. A surprise awaited me. More than the delightful flowers before me, there were fruits.
They start off looking like huge green marbles.

As they mature they change their shape.
When they ripen they burst open revealing seeds like this:
Maybe we can use these cotton-like fibres for stuffing pillows.
When the seeds are dispersed, this is what becomes of the fruit.

2 comments:

slurp! said...

the flowers are unique. any fragrance?

Mableinsingapore said...

The only flowers I smell are roses. Others, I just don't have the habit because of what I have been told as a child about smelling flowers. Next time I see these flowers I will try to remember...