Golden Shower Tree

The golden shower tree, Cassia fistula, is a flowering tree also called purging cassia, Indian laburnum and pudding-pipe tree. Its yellow flowers hang in showers, and its long seed pods give the pudding-pipe name. The page calls it both the national tree and the national flower of Thailand, where the yellow flowers symbolise royalty. It is the state flower of Kerala, where the flowers are ritually important in preparing the Kani for the Vishu festival. In Sri Lanka, where it is called Ehela, it is often cultivated at Buddhist temples. In Ayurveda it is known as aragvadha, meaning disease killer. The page says the fruit pulp is a purgative, and that Ayurvedic texts strongly advise against self-medication or any use without medical supervision. Little modern research has been done on it despite use in herbalism for millennia.