Mad About Flowers

If you love flowers, you’ll love Guanacaste in the summer

The rainy season in the Guanacaste region where Siva Ashram is located comes to an end in November. The clouds start to clear up revealing more blue sky throughout the day. The grounds begin to dry under the intense heat and many of the deciduous trees start to drop their leaves.

What follows in the coming months of the dry season is a perfectly orchestrated unveiling of colors. Bare branches and twigs are enveloped in flowers that spring to life in a technicolor display that only nature can pull off.

In many places around the world, spring brings with it a blossoming of flowering trees. This spectacle often only lasts a few weeks at the most but not in Guanacaste. From December through June the trees take turns flowering, turning hillsides and plains into stunning feasts for the eyes.

An Arboreous Spectacle

When nature dresses up for its yearly gala

At Siva Ashram we are starting to witness the trees that we have planted bloom and flower. The entrance driveway to the gardens is flanked by about thirty Delonix regia trees on either side. In May, these barren trees burst into flaming red creating a stunning driveway tunnel of flowers. Our Cortez Amarillo trees flower for only three days but what a spectacular three days those are! The iridescent yellow takes your breath away and the entire coast comes alive in perfect synchronicity.

The white and pink flowers of the Roble Sabana tree are gorgeous against the blue summer sky but being a delicacy of the Howler monkeys this sight is not long-lived. The Brazilian firetree is fast-growing and hence towers above the canopy and its inverted cone shape top bursts into a perfect yellow. The highly medicinal Cortez Negro has just started to flower putting out clumps of bright pink flowers.

In mid-February, the Cassia Grandis makes itself known. Standing tall, it stunningly displays masses of salmon-pink flowers in clusters that truly capture the eye against the stark brown of the summer landscape. An important bee plant, this tree with its dark, almost black, trunk and branches creates the perfect contrasts for the flowers that seem to stay on the tree for what feels like a few weeks.

We are waiting for our endangered Cocobolo tree to burst into white flowers and for our Ceiba Speciosa to boast its pink flowers any year now. Amidst these show-stoppers are a plethora of other trees and plants in our gardens that unfold their flowers during the summer months providing a feast for bees, butterflies, birds and other creatures.