Coral-bean

Erythrina herbacea, the coral-bean or cherokee bean, is a perennial shrub or subshrub in the Fabaceae family native to the south-eastern United States and northern Mexico, where it grows in sandy pine woods, hammocks, and coastal scrub. In the northern part of its range the stems die back to a woody rootstock each winter and reach one to two metres in summer; in frost-free areas it forms a more persistent woody shrub up to four metres tall. The stems and petioles are armed with short curved prickles. The alternate leaves are pinnately trifoliate with broadly triangular to arrowhead-shaped leaflets, the terminal one largest. In spring before the leaves expand, the plant produces striking elongate racemes of narrow, tubular scarlet flowers up to six centimetres long, attractive to hummingbirds. The fruits are dark constricted pods that split open to reveal shiny bright red seeds containing toxic alkaloids.