Jacaranda

 

View the beauty of this glorious jacaranda mimosifolia tree in full bloom.  They are everywhere in Johannesburg and Pretoria in spring.  South Africans look forward to the explosion of soft violet leaves every October, signaling the end of chilly winters and the rebirth that comes with spring. Traveling down an avenue canopied with these trees makes me feel like I’m in a fantasy novel, so enchanted by their majesty and color that I have pulled over more than once to snap photos. Local lore says that a person will have good luck if a jacaranda bloom falls on their head. 

Originating in South America, the jacaranda was brought to South Africa somewhere between 1830 and the 1880s, at the height of the gold rush.  Planted along many of the streets of Johannesburg and Pretoria, the trees were charged with making the dusty landscape of the booming cities lovely and livable. They look like their entire existence to bring pleasure, kind of like the mockingbird.

But, they are not like a mockingbird.  The trees are alien, invasive, and dangerous. After the delicate petals float down to the ground like a shower from that fantasy novel I envision, they become deadly. People slip, and motorcyclists and bicyclists skid on the velvety purple carpet. I have seen the slips and trips and felt the back tire of my motorcycle shimmy back and forth like a snake as I road through a gauntlet of the gorgeous jacarandas.  

They were labeled a “weed and an invader” by the South Africa parliament because they threatened the ecosystem. Indigenous flora suffers and dies from the water-sucking species.  The government won’t cut them down, but it is now illegal to plant them anywhere in the country.  

Is it sad to know this?  Or, is there a lesson to be learned? I think there are many lessons to be learned that transcend botany.