Delhi’s ‘lone’ yellow Palash tree in full bloom in Yamuna biodiversity park

In the Yamuna Biodiversity Park, a lone Palash tree, which is believed to be the only such tree in the city, is standing in all its glory now ripe with yellow flowers.

The fiery red flowers of the Palash tree — that rightfully earns its name of ‘flame of the forest’ — is in full bloom in the national capital these days. Spotting them is a fairly easy task too. But have you ever seen Palash trees laden with yellow flowers instead of the trademark red?

A view of Yamuna Biodiversity Park. (HT file photo)

In the Yamuna Biodiversity Park, a lone Palash tree, which is believed to be the only such tree in the city, is standing in all its glory now ripe with yellow flowers. Scientists said this variety of Palash — scientifically known as Butea monosperma var. lutea — is a rare mutation and is found in very few numbers, compared to its red counterpart.

Faiyaz Khudsar, scientist-in-charge at the biodiversity park, said the 9770 hectares of the park has only one such tree, which is flowering at this time of the year

“We believe that this is the only such tree in the entire city. We had a few Delhi forest department officials visit and they too think this might be lone yellow flowering Palash in the city. While the regular red Palash flowers can be seen in high numbers across the city, this yellow variety is known to adapt well in the floodplains,” said Khudsar.

CR Babu, professor emeritus at the Centre for Environmental Management of Degraded Ecosystem in Delhi University, said red is the dominant colour of flowers in butea monosperma trees. However, with certain mutations, the red colour becomes recessive and the flower gets yellow.

“In Delhi, except this one on the floodplains, there is no other such tree. In fact, if you look at the overall population of such varieties across India, you will find these to be fewer in number, compared to the red ones. Except for the colour of the flower, there is no major difference in the two varieties of trees. But over a period of time with evolution, the yellow variant can become a separate species. This could essentially happen because the yellow and red flowers attract different pollinators, and as it multiplies, they can attain more characteristics that differentiate them,” Babu said.

Babu said that these yellow varieties are found in reasonably high numbers in parts of Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.

Senior officials from the Delhi forest department said that while there was no concrete evidence of this tree to be the sole Yellow Palash in the city, because of the absence of a tree census in the city. However, observations suggest that it could be the lone yellow Palash tree.

“Based on observations, we have not seen any yellow varieties of Palash in Delhi. We cannot say for sure, because there are no written records or census available to prove this claim,” said a senior forest official.

Khudsar said that visitors can catch a glimpse of this “rare” variety of Palash in the grounds of the Yamuna Biodiversity Park till May first week, which is its flowering time.

Environmentalist and author of the book ‘Trees of Delhi’ Pradip Krishen also confirmed that the yellow variant of Palash is only a mutant and not a different species.

“The yellow variant is definitely rarer and I have seen only two such trees. There is also a white variety of Palash. The soil conditions and the requirements for its growth may differ slightly but the pollinators that these flowers attract are nearly the same,” said Krishen.