Handkerchief Tree

There are not very many of these trees in UK but they may be found in some parks or botanic gardens and I have seen them in two different places this week.

Two white bracts on the Handkerchief Tree (Davidia involucrate) surround the small purple flowers and look as if they are hankies hanging on the tree. In large it is possible to see some little flowers which will later develop into round nuts on stalks. They also resemble doves resting on the branches hence the name Dove Tree or even Ghost Tree because at night they can look like little ghosts. This morning the wind was blowing some of the white bracts off and they did look like hankies falling on to the ground.

According to Wikipedia;

The genus Davidia is named after Father Armand David (1826–1900), ("Père David"), a French Vincentian missionary and keen naturalist who lived in China. David first described the tree in 1869 as a single tree found at over 2,000 m (6,562 ft) altitude, and sent dried specimens to Paris; in 1871, Henri Baillon described it as a new genus and species.

Scottish plant hunter Augustine Henry again found a single tree, this time in the Yangtse Ichang gorges and sent the first specimen to Kew Gardens. Plant collector Ernest Henry Wilson was employed by Sir Harry Veitch to find Henry's tree but arrived to find that it had been felled for building purposes; however, he later found a grove of the trees overhanging a sheer drop. Returning to England, Wilson had his boat wrecked, but managed to save his Davidia specimens.