chriscanary
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Can You Identify This Tree? Please?

There are 2 trees along the fence of Hollywood High School, in Hollywood, CA., that caught my eye.
They're crammed in with overgrown pines and palms but they're still visable from the street. Of course, it was the one day I left the house without my camera...

They're about 30 or more feet tall. Leggy, not too bushy.

They have huge pink and magenta flowers on them. The color of a Magnolia, but the shape of some Orchid species.
After the flower dies, they develop these huge "fruit".
The fruit is hard, like a gourd, around the size of a chayote squash.
The exterior is the color of an green avocado.
They hang from the trees, not in clusters, dropping like bowling balls on the sidewalk below, where I retrieved one from the gutter.

The inside of the fruit is also similar in color to an avocado. After cutting the fruit in half (using much pressure and a meat cleaver), the inside started to darken immediately.

The seeds inside are clistered together in the middle, like a pumpkin, and there is a lot of white, shimmering, fibrous material

[img]https://i34.tinypic.com/11rdb9d.jpg[/img]
[img]https://i37.tinypic.com/30wsh95.jpg[/img]

I've never seen anything like this before.
I'd like to plant some seeds and see what happens, But I want to know first if this is a "forbidden" invasive species or something.

Thanks for your help.[/img]

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bonsaiboy
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I'm not exacly shure what it is, but my guess is its a calabash tree. Take a look at the following website to see if this matches https://toptropicals.com/catalog/uid/crescentia_cujete.htm

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Kisal
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Bonsaiboy, I looked and looked for that, to no avail! I think you've nailed it! :D 8)

chriscanary
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I'm not sure if that's it. The flowers are the right colors, but different.
The fruit looks slightly different too. It may be a close cousin.
We get frost occasionally in L.A.
The tree in the link, can't tolerate any frost.
An evolved species? :lol:



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