Coral Bean in the Borderlands

If it wasn’t for the Gadsden Purchase, coral bean or Erythrina flabelliformis wouldn’t be found in southeastern Arizona or southwestern New Mexico and so we are in its northern most range out of Mexico. It has so much to love…amazing bright red flowers on naked branches followed by fan shape green leaves (flabelliformis!) and then the long pods that dry and dehisce and dangle to display the red seed. Seed so hard that I use a file or grinding wheel to break the seed coat so it’ll germinate. It’s in the pea family Fabaceae and the pea family rocks the…