The "rebirth" of the Orchid tree...

The two orchid trees outside planted directly behind our unit (on the street side of the wall) are unusual in that they drop their leaves during the spring/summer time. For weeks the area around them is littered with brown, hearth-shaped leaves, and the suddenly, in mid-summer, little green leaves begin to appear at the tips of all the branches, and those beautiful orchid flowers return to the tree. It won't be that many more months before those branches will again be so laden with blooms that they'll reach nearly to the ground. (Check out one of "our" songbirds perched among the new growth.)