Can anyone help identify this landscape tree? It's used all over Albuquerque, New Mexico, where I am. The individual flowers look to me like sweet peas but overall the tree reminds me of wisteria, the way the bunches of flowers hang down like grape clusters. The flowers are very fragrant and perfume the whole neighborhood. Could it be a legume of some sort?
I think you are correct. I find it somewhat puzzling, though, that all of the websites I found about Purple Robe say that it's very invasive (suckering, re-seeding), but I haven't noticed any of that around this particular tree. But the photos are a dead-on match. Thanks!
I am almost positive it is a Robina but don't think it's neomexicana because this tree is a lot taller than 25 feet, which is the maximum height listed on the website you linked to.
Purple Robe is not a form of black locust. Garden hybrid forms of locusts like this may be impossible to identify when recently circulated named plants to compare to are not present at outlets or in labeled collections. Descriptions often do not match specimens found in the landscape. If you have access to an arboretum or botanical garden with reliable labeling, pick a flowering sprig of the tree in question and take it there to see if they have the same variety.
Um, according to this PDF page (http://hort.ufl.edu/database/documents/pdf/tree_fact_sheets/robpsec.pdf) put out by the US Forest Service, Robinia pseudoacacia 'Purple Robe' is generally called 'Purple Robe' Black Locust. My specimen tree may not be a Purple Robe, but Purple Robes do seem to be a cultivar of black locust. Thanks for the suggestion of taking a specimen to a local arboretum. Unfortunately the flowering season is already over for these trees so I guess that method will have to wait until next year.
I came across one of these pink-flowering Robinia today, I think for the first time. What a beauty! The Parks Board's list shows this single street tree as Robinia pseudoacacia 'Purple Robe'. There didn't seem to be any thorns, and the bark was fairly smooth. I thought I was seeing a lot of possibilities for the ID, but then came across this Missouri Botanical Garden page which calls it Robinia 'Purple Robe' and says:
'Decaisneana' X 'Monument' was claimed by inventor of tree in patent documents, where both parents are mistakenly listed as pure forms of Robinia pseudoacacia. http://www.google.com/patents/USPP2...u-qS5Dw#v=onepage&q=plant patent 2454&f=false 'Decaisneana' is instead from R. pseudoacacia X R. viscosa, and 'Monument' belongs to R. hispida - making Purple Robe PP 2454 only 1/3 black locust.
Wish the Robinia varieties most commonly planted here were not so weakly formed - the branch angles, etc.. Quite a few disintegrate and split apart with wind and rain. Sure like the flowers though and the small leaves. ...
