Alternate name: Redbud, Judas Tree
Family: Fabaceae, Pea view all from this family
Description Tree with short trunk, rounded crown of spreading branches, and pink flowers that cover the twigs in spring.
Height: 40' (12 m).
Diameter: 8" (20 cm).
Leaves: 2 1/2-4 1/2" (6-11 cm) long and broad. Heart-shaped, with broad short point; without teeth; with 5-9 main veins; long-stalked. Dull green above, paler and sometimes hairy beneath; turning yellow in autumn.
Bark: dark gray or brown; smooth, becoming furrowed into scaly plates.
Twigs: brown, slender, angled.
Flowers: 1/2" (12 mm) long; pea-shaped, with 5 slightly unequal purplish-pink petals, rarely white; 4-8 flowers in a cluster on slender stalks; in early spring before leaves.
Fruit: 2 1/2-3 1/4" (6-8 cm) long; flat narrowly oblong pods; pointed at ends; pink, turning blackish; splitting open on 1 edge; falling in late autumn or winter. Several beanlike flat elliptical dark brown seeds.
Habitat Moist soils of valleys and slopes and in hardwood forests.
Range New Jersey south to central Florida, west to S. Texas, and north to SE. Nebraska; also N. Mexico; to 2200' (671 m).
Discussion Very showy in early spring, when the leafless twigs are covered with masses of pink flowers, Eastern Redbud is often planted as an ornamental. The flowers can be eaten as a salad, or fried. According to myth, Judas Iscariot hung himself on the related Judas-tree (Cercis siliquastrum L.) of western Asia and southern Europe, after which the white flowers turned red with shame or blood.
