Cercis japonica

now that does look nice

Thanks. It's a funny old tree - the flowers come out before the leaves.

how strange,

This is a beautiful tree, my neighbour next door keeps telling me she has one of these, but I have never seen it in flower, it is a very big tree.

The story of this tree is obviously biblical and the flowers are quite beautiful, stories say they apparently are blushing in shame.

I have Cercis Canadensis and it never has more than one or two flowers. This is stunning!

Thank you all.

Is Cercis Canadensis also a tree, Karen? I don't know that one . . .

Ah, just looked it up in my ancient Hillier's Manual of Trees and Shrubs . . . it says C. canadensis is "unfortunately not very free-flowering in this country." So there you go - it's not just you!