Golden shower tree (Cassia fistula)

Tengguli or trengguli or kolobur or golden shower tree (Cassia fistula) is a species of plant in the Fabaceae, bright yellow flowers, dropping leaves, up to 20 meters high, branch-free stems about 5 meters, crown wide and spreading, bark pale gray and smooth when young, dark brown and rough when aged.

C. fistula has leaves arranged alternately, compound, even pinnate and 30-40 cm long. Leaf units have 3-8 pairs, 6-20 cm long, 3.5-9 cm wide, elongated ovate and short hairs.

The inflorescences are terminal bunches that hang and are 15-40 cm long. Fragrant flowers and 5 units of petals. The crown is 2-3.5 cm long and is bright yellow in color. The bottom three stamens are S-shaped and longer than the others.

The pods are cylindrical, 20-45 cm long, 1.5 cm wide, hanging, young dark green, dark black and cracked. The inside is divided by partitions into chambers containing 1 seed and each pod contains 25-100 seeds.

The seeds are flat and brown in color, transverse in space, separated by a bulkhead and a kind of sticky flesh and blackish brown in color.

Tengguli grows in tropical deciduous forests, is shade-tolerant, drought-resistant, tolerates rainfall of 480-2720 mm/year, annual temperature of 18-29C and soil pH of 5.5-8.7.

Kolobur is widely used for medicinal and ornamental trees. The pods, seeds, leaves, flowers and bark are used as a laxative, to clean wounds and ulcers, to clean skin fungus, to treat fever and diabetes.

The bark produces bright yellow tannins as a material for making horse shoes or clothing. Good quality wood, durable, strong, solid, heavy, hard, pale yellow to reddish in color and the inner wood is blackish gray. Wood has strong class II and durable class II.

Kingdom: Plantae
Phylum: Tracheophyta
Subphylum: Angiospermae
Class: Magnoliopsida
Order: Fabales
Family: Fabaceae
Subfamily: Caesalpinioideae
Tribe: Cassieae
Subtribe: Cassiinae
Genus: Cassia
Species: Cassia fistula

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