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Yellow trumpetbush (Tecoma stans)

Description

Tecoma stans is a species of flowering perennial shrub in the trumpet vine family, Bignoniaceae, that is native to the Americas. Common names include yellow trumpetbush, yellow bells, yellow elder, ginger-thomas. Tecoma stans is the official flower of the United States Virgin Islands and the floral emblem of The Bahamas. Yellow trumpetbush is an attractive plant that is cultivated as an ornamental. It has sharply toothed, pinnate green leaves and bears large, showy, bright golden yellow trumpet-shaped flowers. It is drought-tolerant and grows well in warm climates. The flowers attract bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds. The plant produces pods containing yellow seeds with papery wings. The plant is desirable fodder when it grows in fields grazed by livestock. Yellow trumpetbush is a ruderal species, readily colonizing disturbed, rocky, sandy, and cleared land and occasionally becoming an invasive weed. Tecoma is a genus of 14 species of shrubs or small trees in the trumpet vine family, Bignoniaceae. Twelve species are from the Americas, while the other two species are African. The American species range from the extreme southern United States through Central America and the Antilles south through Andean South America to northern Argentina. The generic name is derived from the Nahuatl word tecomaxochitl, which was applied by the indigenous peoples of Mexico to plants with tubular flowers. Trumpetbush is a common name for plants in this genus.

Taxonomic tree

  • Domain: Eukarya

    • Kingdom: Plantae

      • Phylum: Magnoliophyta

        • Class: Magnoliopsida

          • Order: Lamiales

            • Family: Bignoniaceae

              • Genus: Tecoma