Bougainvillea (Bougainvillea glabra)
Bougainvillea is a woody, climbing vine planted throughout the island as an ornamental. Often seen climbing up over old dead cedars trees or over fences and walls, it produces flowers regularly in summer and winter.
Bougainvillea was discovered in 1767 near Rio de Janeiro and was introduced to Britain in 1829. L.H. Smith, in her book Bermuda’s Oldest Inhabitants, writes that it was “thought by many that the first bougainvillea in Bermuda was sent to Governor Lefroy from Gibraltar in 1874 by Col. Laffan, R.E., afterwards Govenor Laffan.” Yet she also included a letter to the editor of the Royal Gazette published in October 1930 in which Henry Denison, an officer with Capt. Seville Reid, R.E., claims to have brought “the bougainvillea creeper” from Gibraltar in 1874 and that “it was planted at Government House”.
The colourful parts of bougainvillea that most people think are flowers are, in fact, bracts, or modified leaves. These bracts surround the long, narrow, inconspicuous and tubular flowers which are white at the very top and, below, are the colour of the bract (photo). It is these papery bracts that give bougainvillea its other common name of paper flower. The flowers are borne in threes, each flower attached to a bract. (Other common and unrelated, well-known plants whose ‘flowers’ are actually colourful modified leaves are poinsettia, bird-of-paradise and shrimp plant.)
There are at least two species of of bougainvillea in Bermuda. B. glabra has stems, leaves and flowers that are sometimes sparsely covered with extremely short hairs. The bracts are typically rosy-purple but can also be lighter in cultivated varieties. Bougainvillea spectabilis is described as vigorous and tall-growing. It often has stout spines and has easily visible long hairs on the stems, undersides of the leaves, and the outside of the flowers. The leaves have a wonderful feel when rubbed gently between your fingers. The bracts of its large flower clusters are about two inches long and are also typically bright rosy-purple. There are numerous cultivated varieties of bougainvillea with ‘flowers’ of different shades or purple, red, pink, salmon and white, depending on the variety. Several different colour-varieties of both species are grown locally.
Bougainvillea is names after L. de Bougainville, a French navigator (1727-1811) who circumnavigated the world in the late eighteenth century. The species name of glabra means smooth or without hairs, and spectabilis means remarkable. Another member of this family grown in Bermuda is marvel of Peru, also known as four-o’clock.
Bermuda’s Flora Volume 1 & Volume 2 by Lisa Green are both available at the Bermuda Bookstore.
