Regions: South India

The sap palm of Bengal and the Deccan, tapped in winter for nolen gur.

A woody climber with fringed white-and-yellow flowers and a heavy sweet scent.

Red brushes of stamens on drooping branches; a hardy naturalised garden tree.

Yellow flower spires and copper seed pods; the summer partner to the gulmohar.

Maroon night flowers on long ropes, then metre-long fruit that alarms everybody.

A slender Western Ghats evergreen with purple fruit that souring curries depend on.

A tough dry-forest tree with papery winged seeds that blanket the ground in March.

The scented heartwood tree of the southern Deccan — a hemiparasite that needs a host.

The red-timbered endemic of the Andhra hills; slow, valuable and heavily poached.

Glossy drooping new leaves in pink, then white flowers with a gold centre.