Which tree has red flowers? The month and the flower shape decide

Late winter and early spring: red maple and red buckeye

Red maple is the first red bloom of the year across eastern North America, and the one most people never notice up close. The NC State profile describes small red flowers, under an inch, in short-stemmed, drooping clusters that open from January to March in North Carolina, before the leaves appear. From a distance the whole crown takes on a red haze. Paired, winged seeds about 3/4 inch long follow in red, pink or yellow, turning tan by summer. The leaves have three to five triangular lobes, the lower two much smaller. Red maple grows from Newfoundland south to Florida and west to Minnesota, Oklahoma and Texas. The red maple vs sugar maple page shows how to tell the two once the leaves are out.

Red buckeye is a small native tree or large shrub of the Southeast, 15 to 25 feet tall. According to NC State, it carries upright clusters of red to orange-red tubular flowers 6 to 10 inches long in March and April, just as its leaves open. Each leaf is divided like a hand into 5, sometimes 7, leaflets. NC State gives its natural range from North Carolina's coast and Piedmont west to Texas, Oklahoma, Missouri and Illinois. NC State rates it as highly toxic: all parts, including the seeds, are listed as poisonous if eaten. The chestnut vs buckeye page shows how to tell buckeye seeds and husks from chestnuts. Red horse chestnut, a planted hybrid with pink to red spikes, is covered on the pink flowers page.

Summer: crape myrtle

From July to September across the South, a small tree covered in red flower clusters is almost always a crape myrtle. NC State describes terminal clusters 6 to 18 inches long of flowers with six crinkled, crepe-paper petals, and cultivars in white, pink, red or purple. The leaves are small, 1 to 2.75 inches, and mostly opposite. The surest field mark is the bark: thin, smooth, pale brown to gray, peeling in patches. Crape myrtle is native to eastern Asia and the Himalayas and ranges from 6 to 30 feet depending on the cultivar. The crape myrtle page covers the plant through the year.

Frost-free states: bottlebrush, royal poinciana, African tulip tree

In Florida, south Texas, southern California and Hawaii, the red-flowering list is longer, and each candidate has a flower you cannot confuse once you see it up close.

Bottlebrush looks exactly like its name. The NC State profile describes bright crimson spikes 4 to 5 inches long with up to 40 flowers, each mostly long, bushy stamens. It blooms in spring, summer and fall, and nearly all year where there is no frost. The leaves are leathery, 1 to 3 inches long, coppery when new, and smell of lemon when bruised. After flowering, woody cup-shaped capsules about 1/4 inch stay stuck along the stem. It comes from eastern Australia and is hardy to USDA zones 9 and 10.

Royal poinciana turns the whole crown red. The UF/IFAS fact sheet describes bright red or orange flowers at the branch ends, covering the treetop from May to July, over fern-like leaves 8 to 20 inches long. Dark brown pods 1 to 2 feet long hang on through winter. It grows outdoors only in zones 10B to 11.

African tulip tree has big, ruffled, bell-shaped flowers. UF/IFAS describes yellow to orange-red flowers with yellow tips in clusters at the branch ends, mainly from late winter to spring, on a tree 50 to 60 feet tall. The evergreen leaves are once-divided, about 1.5 feet long, with 6 to 8 pairs of leaflets about 4 inches long. Woody, boat-shaped capsules 6 to 12 inches long follow. UF/IFAS lists it as a "caution" species in south Florida, to be managed to prevent escape, and not a problem species in central and north Florida.

UK, Ireland and New Zealand

Britain and Ireland. A small, rounded, thorny tree with fully double red flowers in May is usually the hawthorn 'Paul's Scarlet', common on streets and in gardens. The RHS describes it as 4 to 8 m tall with lobed, glossy leaves and orange-red berries in autumn, and notes that the fruit should not be eaten. Wild hawthorns in hedges flower white.

New Zealand. Brushes of red stamens around Christmas on a coastal tree mean pōhutukawa. New Zealand's Department of Conservation calls it the country's Christmas tree, says the mainland species grows naturally in the upper half of the North Island, north of New Plymouth and Gisborne, and gives the field test that separates it from rātā: pōhutukawa leaves have hairs on the underside.

Narrow it down in four questions

1. Are the leaves out? No: red maple, or in the tropics African tulip tree. Yes: everything else.
2. What month is it? Late winter, red maple. March to May, red buckeye or a red hawthorn. July to September, crape myrtle. Almost any month in frost-free areas, bottlebrush.
3. What shape is one flower? Tiny tufts (maple), upright tubes (buckeye), crinkled petals (crape myrtle), bristly brush (bottlebrush, pōhutukawa), big bells (African tulip tree).
4. What are the leaves like? Hand-shaped (buckeye), fern-like (royal poinciana), small and opposite with peeling bark (crape myrtle), leathery and lemon-scented (bottlebrush).

Using a photo

A close photo of one flower cluster with a few leaves in the frame is the most useful single picture. Tree Identifier names a tree from one photo, and red maple, crape myrtle, crimson bottlebrush, royal poinciana, African tulip tree and cockspur coral tree are among the species in its Collection. It shows no confidence score or list of alternatives, so check the result against the table above. The follow-up chat can answer a question such as how red buckeye differs from red horse chestnut. Toxicology notes in the app are AI-written; for anything about a child or a pet eating part of a tree, call poison control or a vet.