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Apart from the absence of red simian-like floral parts, Maple Twist makes me think of Monkey’s Hand Tree. There’s the big downy leaves (as above!), the chunky flowers with an ornate centrepiece and the soft fragility of the trunk and stems.
Large leaf on Pterospermum acerifolium, Maple Twist or Dinner Plate Tree
As it turns out, Pterospermum acerifolium is indeed closely related to Chiranthodendron pentadactylon (the scientific names being informative if a little cumbersome). They both belong to what was once Sterculiaceae (think Brachychiton) and is now Malvaceae (think Hibiscus plus now Brachychiton). The flower turns out to be more different than I thought, but we’ll get to that later, like I did when I discovered this plant in Melbourne Gardens.
Maple Twist is also called Dinner Plate Tree on account of the big leaves, which are in fact used to hold or to wrap less savoury things like tobacco. Where it grows naturally – India and southern China, southwards to the Malaysian Peninsular – it gets called Bayur Tree, Machukunda, Bayog, Kanakchampa and more.
Fragrant flowers on Pterospermum acerifolium, Maple Twist or Dinner Plate Tree
Most parts of the plant, including the flowers, are used in India for traditional medicine, to treat ailments from cancer to small pox. In recent years there has been a steady stream of scientific papers demonstrating antibacterial, antioxidant and other medicinal activity in, particularly, leaves and bark. The flowers are mostly used in a tonic, for treatment of various internal and external wounds, while the downy hairs on the undersurface of the leaves are said to prevent bleeding (as well as provide a handy tinder for starting fires).
The leaves are, as the species name suggests, shaped like (large) maple leaves. In dryer climates the tree is deciduous for a short time. When I photographed our Melbourne Gardens specimen, growing among a fine collection of araucarias from New Caledonia, there were plenty of dry leaves on the ground below.
Flower close up of Pterospermum acerifolium, Maple Twist or Dinner Plate Tree
The white flowers, like the red flowers of the Monkey’s Hand Tree, attract bats as pollinators. But close up, they are not remarkably similar (see my post from November 2013) . What I had thought – at a distance of a few metres (the flowers are high in the tree) – to be something like the monkey hand of Chiranthodendron turned out to be the main part of the flower, with petals. The sepals (the layer outside the petals) are pealed back in the mature plant, like a banana skin.
Large foliage and white flowers on Pterospermum acerifolium, Maple Twist or Dinner Plate Tree
In Monkey’s Hand Tree, the petals and sepals seem glued together (I called them, naively perhaps, simply ‘sepals’ in my 2013 post) around the centre-piece which often drops from the flower. In Maple Twist, the petals and inner parts are more likely to fall together to the ground. You can see some of the detail here, but remember I’ve had to photograph this from a distance. I’m assuming the inside bits of the flower somehow conjures up the ‘twist’ part of Maple Twist. Maybe.
What you can’t see, or detect, is the flowers producing a soft perfume. Mostly at night as an extra attractant for those bats but it also appeals to humans – the spent flowers are used as a fragrance and deodoriser for stored clothes and linen.
Spent flowers on Pterospermum acerifolium, Maple Twist or Dinner Plate Tree
The fruits are large and ‘cucumber-shaped’, but given they persist on the tree for up to a year and I could see none on ours, it seems our trees don’t set seed. If they did, the seed would be winged, living up to the genus name which means exactly that (winged seed).
This is a tropical to subtropical tree, but from sometimes higher elevations where temperatures can be lower and rainfall higher. They tolerate a dry season of up to seven months so perhaps they’ll survive conditions in Melbourne in 2090.
It’s grown widely around the world but mostly in Asia and nearby, and seldom, I think, in Australia. At least in the south. Although they can grow in areas with low rainfall, they tend to do best near a water body of some kind. Our tree is next to the Nymphaea Lily Lake and its roots no doubt take advantage of that situation.
Pterospermum acerifolium, Maple Twist or Dinner Plate Tree
[Note: I must thank Stuart Williams (@stuartwilliams_) for alerting me to this species. Stuart posted a picture of the flower on Twitter, 23 December 2016, later remarking that it was taken in Melbourne Gardens. Thanks to these tweets I tracked it down on our census, and to this specimen!]
Hi Tim , I know exactly where the specimen is in the gardens but sadly it is not labelled . Hopefully this can change . Incidentally I have a Chiranodendron pentadactylon in my own garden and it’s up to about two metres in height . I am hoping it will flower in the next four or five years .
That’s great. It would be fun to grow at home. Yes we do struggle with labels for all our plants at the Gardens. This would have had a label, but we need to replace. Also find a digital way to make the information available! Tim
Tim there’s a maple twist in the Sydney Botanic Gardens too – east of the Cunningham obelisk/pond/restaurant – not a great specimen but enough to intrigue me. Hand-flower trees for some reason are rare in Australia, less-so in New Zealand – Dunedin BG has a few; and I saw several in Taranaki and Auckland gardens on recent trips. A bit cool over there for Indian trees, alas. I take it Melbourne’s maple twist is next to the New Caledonian section, going by the Araucarias and Carpolepis in view, yes? Cheers, Stuart
Hi Stuart , the Melbourne Botanic gardens have three Chiranodendron’s growing , also I discovered Melbourne’s Government House have one