Aesculus pavia Seeds | Red Buckeye
LATIN NAME: Aesculus pavia
COMMON NAME: Red Buckeye
Plant Profile
Red buckeye is a large shrub or small tree of three to six metres, with palmately divided leaves and upright panicles of tubular red flowers that open in April before the leaves are fully out. It grows in the understorey of woods and along streams from Virginia to Texas.
The flowers are built for hummingbirds, and the ruby-throated hummingbird arrives on its northward migration at about the same week the first flowers open. A plant in full bloom is loud with them, and the plant is worth growing for that alone. The nut is smooth and shiny, the colour of a conker, and it sits in a leathery capsule that splits into three in September.
Science & Biotechnology
The genus produces aescin, a mixture of triterpene saponins that lyses red blood cells, and every part of the plant contains it. The seed is the most concentrated, and poisoning of cattle and of children who chew the nut is well documented. Red buckeye is generally regarded as less toxic than the European horse chestnut, which is not the same as safe.
Aesculus pavia crosses readily with the European horse chestnut, and the hybrid, Aesculus x carnea, is the red-flowered tree sold in parks. It inherits the red colour from the American parent and the tolerance of heavier soil from the European one, and it is propagated by grafting because the seedlings vary.
Uses & Benefits
The plant is grown as an ornamental for its early colour in shade, where little else is in flower, and as a nectar source for hummingbirds in a garden that has room for a shrub of this size. It is not a tree for a small border, since it leafs out late and goes bare early.
The seed is not edible without long leaching, and even then the margin is narrow. Native practice used the crushed seed to stun fish, a technique that is now illegal and destructive, and the powdered nut was used as a poultice on sores. The name buckeye comes from the pale scar on the seed, which was thought to resemble the eye of a male deer, and the tree gives its name to the state of Ohio.
Growing from Seed
Sow the seed as soon as it falls, since it has no dormancy but loses viability if it dries. Push it on its side into deep pots of loam and grit, cover with two centimetres of mix, and keep it cool. The root emerges first and may go twenty centimetres down before the shoot appears, which is why a shallow tray fails.
Plant out in autumn or early spring in a position with sun for part of the day and soil that does not waterlog. Water the first two summers. Prune only to remove a crossing branch, since the plant flowers on short spurs and hard cutting removes the next season’s bloom.
Our Take
An early-flowering shrub for a shady corner, worth its space for the hummingbirds it brings in April. Keep the seed away from children and livestock.
Related Reading
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