Pithecelobium dulce

It is natural that this plant soon became one of my favorites.  This plant with such unusual but lovely foliage ranging from mottled or plain green, pink and white, just captures my heart with its charm. One problem, it has tiny spikes at the base of the leaf.  The leaves are kidney shapes and comes as a pair. The plant sometimes tend to shed a lot of its leaves when stressed.  Once  I went off on a trip for almost a week and when I returned, most of the leaves had dropped.  It had not been watered. However, after a bit of pruning, it was  soon back on track, although for a few more days, the leaves continued to drop.  Needless to say I was so relieved as I thought I had lost the plant for sure !

I planted this plant in a container as I have seen those planted on the ground grow very big. It is a slow grower in the container, not fussy as long as it is kept watered. It seems to love the sun, put it in the shade, the leaves are more white. However to get those pink leaves , placed the plant under direct sunlight. The pink leaves come up  soon enough and the plant definitely looks more enchanting, blushing in the sun......hmm.

The stems tend to grow outwards, so I keep tugging the ends in as they grow. I use the soft gardening wire to tie the ends. I am trying to make it grow in a cylindrical form.  This was one of my early shots  of the plant where I had just tied the ends to form some sort of shape.  The plant is easy to propagate with cuttings.  However the cuttings grow very slowly.  So far I have not seen this plant flowering. Nor have I seen any pests on the plant.  It is easy to understand why I like this plant a lot.  Its name is quite a mouthful, but one can call it by its common names like  Variegated Madras Thorn, Manila Tamarind, Sweet Inga, Monkey Pod etc. Personally I like the name  'Snow on the Bush ",  but that  refers to  another plant which has the similarities in the foliage color of mottled green, white and pink.  I like the look when the plant is all white on top ; see  the second photo above.